We’re back with another Styled in Ireland post today – highlighting Irish designers and giving you tips for visiting Dublin or getting out and about as a local.
Tips for Travellers
Next time you’re visiting Dublin and find yourself with a dry afternoon, here’s what I would recommend. Pick up a beautiful, Irish made blanket (it’ll double as a cherished souvenir later!), grab a few treats from a local bakery, and find yourself a park for some people watching. I can’t think of a better way to spend a few hours.
For this sweet picnic, I picked up treats from KC Peaches on Nassau Street. They have a huge range of tea cakes, brownies, biscuits and other sweet treats that pack up perfectly in little brown boxes for a picnic. In addition to sweets, they have a great range of fresh salads and sandwiches, coffees and teas. (If you catch them in the evening, they have a Wine Cave with live jazz in the basement!)
There are so many beautiful parks in Dublin, almost always filled with blossoming flower beds and lots of people bustling about. Try Stephen’s Green at lunchtime, Merrion Square on a weekend when artists hang their work on the park gates, the Iveagh Gardens for a quieter option, or Herbert Park if you find yourself on the south side of the city centre. I think they’re all equally lovely!
Highlight // Irish Designer
Now for that beautiful purple blanket. It’s a lambswool throw made by an Irish company in Kilkenny that has been making beautiful textiles from Irish wool for 800 years. Cushendale Woolen Mills produces 100% Irish products, which is no small feat! From the sheep, to the river water used to wash the wool, to the Irish family that’s been weaving beautiful materials in Kilkenny for generations. I just love everything about their story!
Sponsored by the Irish Design Shop
The Irish Design Shop is one of my absolute favorite spots to visit in Dublin. Their main shop is tucked behind the Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre at the top of Grafton Street – in an old building that used to store hay! Now the building houses their beautifully curated shop, filled with jewellery, prints, and various housewares, as well as studio space for fifteen artists and designers. You can even see the studio space from the shop, and owners Clare and Laura are always happy to let people have a peek!
The Irish Design Shop also offers jewellery classes, including one where you can make your own wedding rings! But book quickly – they fill up fast!
You can pick up that beautiful Cushendale blanket in the Irish Design Shop on Cow’s Lane or at their second location at the Royal Hibernian Academy on Ely Place. If you’re shopping from afar, you can order online here.
Zara Home hit America last week. We have several Zara stores but no Zara Home. Perhaps you can only order online, but wouldn’t it be fun to see a Zara Home store? Those teaspoons might have to make an appearance in my kitchen sooner than later!
I’m so excited to share a new gig I’m starting! I’m going to be the new DIY contributor over on the Irish wedding blog One Fab Day. Each week I’ll be sharing sweet and simple – and completely doable – projects you can do for a wedding or a party or even your own home. I’m a sucker for weddings, so now I get to talk about them every week!
The lovely girls behind One Fab Day asked me a few questions about my favorite DIYs and the ones that didn’t turn out so well. Check out my answers here!
Here we are again, dear readers. Another One Day in Dublin post. This time, joined again by my friend Naomi and my sister-in-law Angie, we wanted to check out the cooler side of Temple Bar. Temple Bar can be tricky – full of tacky tourist trap pubs – but we found so many cool spots! In fact, we really only accomplished about half of Temple Bar. Turns out there’s a very neat, local side to Temple Bar. Let’s get started!
We’re nothing if not predictable. We started with brunch – in the form of two different kinds of scones and pancakes to share at Queen of Tarts on Cow’s Lane. First of all, it’s adorable. Second of all, it’s delicious. My partners in crime absolutely loved their huge pot of tea and I was a big fan of my cappuccino. Yum, yum, yum.
Suitably fueled, we started with a little browse around the Saturday Cow’s Lane market – pottery, jewellery, prints, in stalls on the street. But the street is lined with cute shops as well. Find has lots of cute vintage and shabby chic housewares. It’s the kind of shop where you keep seeing new things, every time you turn around. Oh, and they accept payment in dollars as well as rubies and emeralds. Quite convenient!
Next stop, Debbie Paul Studio and Gallery. Her pieces are part jewellery and part sculpture, with a small studio space behind the display counter. Eve, the lovely girl minding the shop, demonstrated her signature pins that are really a work of wearable art.
At the bottom of Cow’s Lane, we got stuck in the Gutter Bookshop for way too long. I think we each could have stayed for hours! Cozy, bright and full of a great selection of books. Angie showed us a few classic Irish children’s books I’ll definitely be picking up when we have kids!
This is Scarlet Row, at the bottom of Cow’s Lane. Isn’t it sweet?
We popped into the Ubode Homestore and Cafe and browsed their collection of tea and travel mugs. The decor was adorable.
And of course we had to stop into Industry, a well curated shop full of industrial bits, big and small, for your home. I loved this scrapwood wallpaper!
We popped in to the Cow’s Lane Designer Studio for just a few minutes (tip: perfect place to pick up souvenirs or gifts if you’re visiting Dublin!) but it was so crowded we didn’t last long. I did manage to spot this cute bottle of clay buttons from Karo Art and think they’ll make a cute Christmas present in a few months!
Now, lest you think we spent the whole day shopping and eating treats, we did sneak in a little culture! We stopped in to City Hall where I spent most of the time staring at the ceiling and the floor. Some of the buildings in Dublin have the most amazing ceilings and floors!
Right next to City Hall is Dublin Castle. And a guard hut we had to try out! Here’s Angie!
And me, trying my most serious guard face, and then not being able to take myself seriously!
After that little detour, we made a beeline for the Chester Beatty Library. If you live in Dublin and you haven’t been, go. If you visit, also go. It’s a huge, free collection of the paintings, prints and artifacts collected by Sir Alfred Chester Beatty. It includes some of the oldest known versions of the Bible – they’re only tiny bits that are really worn but the whole exhibition is so interesting.
Before we left, Angie asked if we had seen the rooftop garden. I didn’t even know there was a rooftop garden! In Dublin, it’s hard to get up very high to get much of a view, so the garden is an absolute treat. Plus, it was deserted and we had it all to ourselves! You can see the whole back side of Dublin Castle and it’s really fun to watch the kids run around the grassy spot at the front.
After all that culture, we were hungry. Saturday’s Temple Bar market is a great spot for lunch, so we picked up quiche from the Gallic Kitchen. When they offer their tomato chutney, do not turn it down. It completes the quiche.
We could have stopped for a glass of wine and some oysters – that always looks so fun and festive! But we’re fiercely loyal to our tomato chutney. Ha!
I did pick up one of these selection boxes for dinner later. Five euro for five different kinds of cheese – including one made with cumin seeds that was so different than any cheese I’ve ever had.
And finally, on our way out of the square, we picked up hot apple cider with a shot of apple brandy from Llewellyn’s Orchard stand. It’s as close to real American-style apple cider as I’ve found.
All cozied up, we headed for the train and made our way home. In the course of about four hours, we had covered so many shops and only made it halfway through Temple Bar. So consider this part one – we’ll have to explore the other half, including lots of vintage shops and more cute cafes, soon!
Kim from This is Álainn is back with another guest post this morning! Enjoy!
Ode to Autumn
While autumn leaves fall around us, a sparkly new jewellery boutique Coldlilies has just sprung up online offering a style edit of Ireland’s leading designers’ collections. So in a fitting tribute to this glorious season, here’s a quick taster of what’s on offer from four big names on their books.
Chupi Sweetman
Chupi’s nicely textured 13 leaf gold necklace (1) is that perfect t-shirt friendly opera length, meaning it comes to just above your nave. Double it up for added cuteness or even
team it with her fabulous feathered earrings (6) cast from a real swan feathers. Wow! Necklace €69.00 / Earrings €98.00
Vivien Walsh
Singly worn or stacked with other jangling bracelets, Vivien’s leaf cluster gold bangle (4)
comes with equally charming emerald green bead drop earrings and neck chain.
Her range also includes these adorable gold vermeil twig earrings (5) with pale green faceted beads. Bracelet €40 / Earrings €45
Róisín Sheridan
Quirky natural beauties– Roisin photo-etches hand-drawn natural scenes into her sterling silver pieces like this ‘Tree Ring’. (3) / €90
Jennifer Kinnear
Jennifer’s big and bold tribal wooden pieces make for perfect seasonal wrist candy – this layered bracelet (2) with bright yellow perspex exterior also comes with a matching over-sized palm wood ball. Bracelet €95.00 / Ring €50.00
Glittery, sparkly and sweet. Dublin’s largest selection of trimmings and ribbons all in one cute store. Talking about A. Rubanesque today over on Poppytalk!
Happy Friday! This week crawled and flew at the same time. The days are getting shorter and it’s getting chilly outside. I was trying not to wear my hat and gloves yet, but I gave up on that plan this morning because it was just too cold walking to the train! Is it fall where you are?
I’ve been on the look-out for pumpkins in Dublin. If you see any for sale, will you let me know? I can’t wait to put a few on our front step. I miss the days when we used to grow them in our garden in China Village!
Yesterday, I had my second Snapshot of a Marriage column on Snippet & Ink featuring a wonderful couple with some great advice. Have a peek! Since the series will be popping up every Thursday, I’m going to include them in my Friday Finds each week. Next week I’ll be starting another (totally different) series on a different wedding blog – more news on that next Wednesday, I hope!
Tomorrow, Michael and I are headed to Limerick for the night. He has a basketball match (surprise, surprise) and we’re spending the night visiting our dear friends Rachael and Anthony (from this house tour!). They just got engaged and we can’t wait to toast them! And I’m oddly excited to get out of Dublin – it’s the first time I’ve left the city since I returned from Maine in early July!
I would love to throw a pop-up dinner party like this. Just need a few partners in crime. Like caterers perhaps?
Beautiful images of building off-the-grid cabins in upstate New York.
Make your own marbled placemats using shaving cream!
My friend Kim is helping open a new screenprinting studio. They’re looking for artwork submissions for an upcoming fundraiser – you submit your artwork, they print it and it’s sold to benefit the new studio. Clever idea!
I was so pleased when I came across this video of the Avoca Woolen Mill, how it works, and who is behind it. Avoca is high on my list of recommendations for people who are visiting (it’s on my Design*Sponge Dublin City Guide here) and I love stopping into their basement food hall for lunch when I’m in the neighborhood. Their pepperade tart is one of my favorite lunchtime treats.
By this point it’s probably quite obvious that I love learning the story behind the person or company making a product. When I learn about the motivation behind something, I care more and the product instantly becomes more valuable to me. There’s so much power in knowing whose hands worked to weave, cut, mould, and shape, and why they work so hard to create.
In the last few months, I’ve realized this is really my passion. It’s what I care about sharing with you. So, hopefully, lots more behind-the-maker stories here on FCV in the future.
But what about you? Does the story behind something leave a more lasting impression?
PS – Avoca is opening a new cafe in Malahide Castle this week!
I’ve mentioned so many times that Michael, my darling 6’4 husband, plays basketball here in Ireland, but I’m not sure I’ve ever explained what that really means and why it’s such a big part of our lives. So that’s what you get today! Lots of basketball info, and what it really means for us eight months of the year! It’s a little wordy, so bear with me. If you’re short on time, there’s a highlight video at the end!
Basketball in Ireland
I’ll start at the very beginning. Michael came to Ireland when he was only six weeks old when his parents moved here from Chicago so his father could play basketball in the Irish league. It sounds a little strange, right? Apparently, during the ’80’s, basketball was becoming a big sport in Ireland – my father-in-law was even in commercials on television! A few Americans who came to Ireland to play later even went on to play in the NBA.
Michael’s parents didn’t plan on staying in Ireland for thirty years, but here they still are (and I’m so grateful!). His father, Jerome, is a physical education teacher in a high school and coaches a few teams in our neighborhood. Michael’s parents had four more kids here in Dublin, and they all grew up playing basketball. In fact, my father-in-law and all of Michael’s siblings still play basketball in one form or another! Michael’s father now plays in the league just below Michael; two of his brothers play for college teams here and in America, and his sister played Division One basketball in America and is now playing in England while she gets her master’s degree.
Michael plays in the top league in Ireland, called the Superleague. And his team is called Killester. The league considered semi-professional. Each team is allowed to have two paid American players, but only one of them can be on the court at a time. The rest of the players are Irish and they don’t get paid. But that doesn’t stop them from practicing three times each week from September to April, with games around the country each weekend. It’s a big time commitment! Usually, one game at the end of the season is broadcast on national television, but otherwise it’s a somewhat under-the-radar sport in this country.
What basketball means to Michael
Michael loves to play, loves to watch, loves loves loves to coach basketball. But basketball has also been a big source of opportunity for travel, education, and livelihood in Michael’s life (and the life of his family and now our family).
Basketball has meant travelling around Europe for tournaments, seeing the world; it has meant an opportunity to do a post-grad year at a prep school in Massachusetts, which led to four years playing and studying at Colby; and it has meant the chance to live on the beach in southern Spain for a year, getting paid to play and coach. When we moved to Ireland and Michael decided he wanted to go back to school to become a guidance counsellor, he was able to get a scholarship that made it affordable for us.
There are certainly frustrating moments, and I’m sure there will be in the future since we aren’t getting any younger! But basketball is about fun and about opportunities – and now it’s about passing on those opportunities to the kids Michael coaches and someday to our own kids. If and when it ceases to be be fun or bring opportunities to those around us, we’ll re-evaluate.
What basketball means to me
During the basketball season, there is a lot more laundry to do! And so many huge basketball sneakers left around the house! Four nights each week, Michael is out at practice or at a game, which means during the season we don’t see always very much of each other. But it also means that Michael gets to do what he loves to do and play at a higher level for longer than he would get to in America. It makes him happy, so I try to be as supportive as possible. During my first year in Ireland, I wasn’t working, so I went to most of Michael’s games around the country. Now I try to make it to his home games and only go to away games if I can tie it in to exploring another part of the country.
Frequently Asked Questions
Now the fun stuff! A few questions I’ve been asked time and again!
Did you ever play basketball?Not even a minute! Although by this point, I’ve watched and talked about basketball for so many hours I’m pretty sure I would have some skills! I actually like watching it, thank goodness, but there are so many things I just don’t understand. When I’m watching basketball, there isn’t a shred of a hope that I could tell when they’re playing zone defense or not. How can people tell that?! I do a little better at recognizing the calls the refs are making, and sometimes I can see a travel or an offensive foul. But that’s about it. I judge Michael’s performance by how many points he made and whether he got any technical fouls. More than ten points, great. No technicals, we are flying!
Does Michael get bummed if he loses? Every so often after a particularly hard loss, one of the fans will remark to the few wives watching that it’s going to be a long night going home with our husbands. I smile and nod, but really, Michael doesn’t let the outcome of the game affect him. He never has. Sometimes he gets disappointed in himself or frustrated by the referees, but usually by the time we get to the car he has moved on. He’s the same way about nearly everything in his life. It’s a trait I’m trying to learn from!
What position does Michael play? Michael plays small forward. Do I know what that means? Errrr…sure I do. He’s the smaller of the big dudes who play inside. But that’s all I’ve got figured out. He’s big, but he’s not the biggest.
Does Michael have any pre-game rituals? Thankfully, he’s really not superstitious or fussy. He doesn’t have to eat the same thing before each game or be left alone to get mentally prepared. The music that’s played during the warm-up seems to matter a lot, which means Michael usually makes the warm-up CD on the day of the game. Often by the time the game starts I feel like my head is going to explode if I hear a certain few songs one more time, but if that’s all I have to put up with, I figure I’m getting away easy! Oh, and his hair! Every few weeks, Michael drives in to the city centre to the African barber for a haircut on game day. That usually adds a little to the swagger (you’ll see it below in the video!).
What’s Michael’s secret weapon? In college, Michael used to be known for his elbows. The league our college was in wasn’t nearly as physical as the way Michael grew up in Ireland, so I’m not sure his opponents knew what to make of him sometimes! Now he throws elbows a little less frequently – or a little more stealthily – but he’s still known for getting very fired up. In college they unofficially named him “First Team All Crazy”. Here in Dublin, his fans lovingly refer to it as “Rage Mode.” I probably should be mortified, but I kind of love it. When he gets really fired up on the court, there’s a lot of yelling and a lot of fist pumping. I just think it’s hilarious. But again, this is probably because he leaves it all on the court. Sometimes I hope the crowd knows he’s not like that at home!
And now for a little highlight video from Mike’s season opener last weekend (click here if it’s being finicky and not showing up here!). Enjoy!
Anything I missed? Dying to know something about basketball in Ireland? He does give autographs, but only if you come cheer at a game! 😉
A few weeks ago, Michael met me after work for Culture Night in Dublin. Once a year, Dublin has a night of free events around the city. We missed it last year and heard it was so much fun we knew we’d try to catch something cultural. We grabbed a quick dinner at Bar Pinxto (for tapas I would highly recommend) and then headed over to Dublin Castle.
Michael had done a little research (he’s great for that!) and found a concert going on in the Coach House at Dublin Castle. The building isn’t typically open to the public so we were excited to even get in the door. After a little wait (lots of places in Dublin had lines down the block!), we got a chance to see a quartet of traditional Irish musicians as well as a a funky jazz quartet – with such an odd collection of instruments like a flamenco guitar, a bass, and an Irish drum!
Nell Ní Chróinín, one of the traditional Irish musicians, won a national Singer of the Year award in 2012 and her voice was lovely. She sang a few songs a capella, including a lullaby. There were a lot of older people in the audience and when it came to the chorus, they all sang along with her, really softly. I loved those moments because I could imagine all my relatives singing the same songs hundreds of years ago.
When I imagine my ancestors, and nearly all of them were Irish, I usually just think of old people in black and white. It’s hard to imagine them as real people! But imagining them singing that song to their kids for generations, which I think is quite likely, gave me goosebumps.
You can hear for yourself in this little video below. It’s more for the audio – we were at the very back!
We’re back with another Styled in Ireland post today – highlighting Irish designers and giving you tips for visiting Dublin or getting out and about as a local.
