SUMMER SCHOOL IN DUBLIN, IRELAND (AFTERNOON TOURS)

HIGHLIGHTS

A five-day study tour exploring Irish Georgian architecture, interiors, and furniture, centered in Dublin with full-day excursions to Counties Kildare and Wicklow. Expert-led visits to Ireland's finest Palladian estates, historic town houses, and world-class archival collections. 

Special Access

Private study session at the Irish Architectural Archive, Merrion Square, including the celebrated Guinness Drawing Collection, featuring original drawings for Leinster House, Carton House, and the great houses of the Irish ascendancy (c.1745–1970s).

The relatively compact nature of Georgian Dublin makes much of the itinerary accessible on foot. Be prepared for comfortable walks and some stairs. Local train and bus lines for excursions outside the city.

WHAT YOU WILL STUDY

Architecture & Interiors

Palladian country houses, Georgian town houses, Rococo and Neoclassical plasterwork, public buildings, and street architecture of 18th-century Dublin.

Architectural Drawings

Original 18th-century design drawings from the Guinness Collection at the Irish Architectural Archive, including designs for Leinster House and Carton House.

Decorative Arts

Irish furniture, silverware, glass, and applied arts from the National Gallery, National Museum (Collins Barracks), and private collections.

Country House Excursions

Full-day visits to Castletown House (Co. Kildare) and Russborough House (Co. Wicklow), two of Ireland's greatest Palladian country houses.

ITINERARY

Monday, 22 June | Georgian Dublin

Morning

• National Gallery of Ireland (Founded 1854 • Merrion Square West, Dublin): One of Europe's finest smaller national galleries, with outstanding collections of Irish and European furniture and decorative arts alongside its celebrated paintings. Students will focus on Irish furniture traditions and the decorative arts of the Georgian period, an essential orientation to the material culture of 18th-century Ireland.
• National Museum, Collins Barracks (Collins Barracks, Benburb Street • Originally built c. 1702 by Thomas Burgh): The visit will focus on Irish silver, glass, and furniture of George I, George II and George III period, providing essential context for the interiors students will encounter throughout the week.

Highlight: The Collins Barracks collection is the finest single survey of Irish decorative arts and Georgian domestic material culture, an essential foundation for the week ahead.

Afternoon

• Fitzwilliam / Merrion Square walkabout: An orientation walk through the heart of 18th-century Dublin, including a visit to the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland at 63 Merrion Square, a typical 1790s terrace house.
• Visit with the American Women's Club of Dublin, a special welcome reception.

Tuesday, 23 June | Castletown House, Co. Kildare

Full Day Excursion

• Castletown House (Designed by Alessandro Galilei (1691–1737) for William Conolly, Speaker of the Irish House of Commons • Celbridge, Co. Kildare): Ireland's largest and earliest Palladian mansion. The imposing façade, like a Roman palace dropped into the Irish countryside, was designed by the Florentine architect Alessandro Galilei. The flanking colonnades and wings are by Sir Edward Lovett Pearce and Richard Castle.

Highlights

• The only fully intact 18th-century Print Room in Ireland
• 18th century furniture
• Three Murano-glass chandeliers from the 18th century
• The 80-foot Long Gallery in Pompeian blue, red, and gold
• Cantilevered Portland stone staircase, a masterwork of Georgian craft
• State Bedroom with original Venetian chairs
• 120-acre parklands along the River Liffey

Wednesday, 24 June | Newbridge House & Irish Architectural Archive

Morning

• Newbridge House, Co. Dublin (Designed by James Gibbs (1682–1754) for Charles Cobbe, Archbishop of Dublin • Built c. 1737 • Donabate, Co. Dublin): An outstanding example of a mid-Georgian Irish country house set in a demesne on Dublin's northern outskirts. Newbridge is remarkable for the near-complete survival of its original Georgian contents, including furniture, portraits, and decorative objects accumulated by the Cobbe family over three centuries. The Red Drawing Room is considered one of the finest Georgian interiors in Ireland.

Afternoon

• Irish Architectural Archive, 45 Merrion Square: Ireland's national archive for the built environment holds one of the world's great collections of architectural drawings. Students will have a private study session examining original 18th-century drawings from the celebrated Guinness Drawing Collection, assembled by the Hon. Desmond Guinness and acquired by the Archive in 1996. The collection (ref. 0096/068) spans c. 1745–1970s and includes original drawings for Leinster House, Carton House, and other great houses of the Irish ascendancy.

Special Access: The Guinness Drawing Collection, original architectural drawings for Ireland's greatest Georgian houses. Students will examine how architects communicated design intentions to patrons and craftsmen.

Thursday, 25 June — Georgian Town Houses, Dublin

Morning

• 9 Henrietta Street (laid out from c. 1720): Dublin's finest surviving early-Georgian streetscape. An award-winning social history museum tracing 300 years of city life within a single address, from grand aristocratic residence, where one family occupied the entire building in the 1740s to notorious tenement, where over 100 people shared the same rooms by 1911. Winner of the Europa Nostra Heritage Award.
• 20 Dominick Street Lower (Developed from c. 1750): An exceptional Georgian town house retaining magnificent original Palladian and Rococo plasterwork interiors. Managed by Youth Work Ireland.

Afternoon

• Newman House, 85–86 St. Stephen's Green (No. 85 designed by Richard Castle (c. 1690–1751) for Captain Hugh Montgomery • Built 1738 • No. 86 by Robert West for Richard Chapell Whaley • Built 1765): Two of Dublin's most celebrated Georgian town houses, now part of University College Dublin. No. 85 contains the finest Apollo Room in Ireland, with superb Palladian plasterwork by the Swiss-Italian stuccodores Paul and Philip Lafranchini. No. 86 is notable for its extraordinary Rococo staircase plasterwork by Robert West. Together they represent the full span of Georgian interior decoration from restrained Palladian to exuberant Rococo.
• Ely House, Ely Place (Built c. 1770 for Henry Loftus, Earl of Ely • Architect attributed to Michael Stapleton (c. 1747–1801): A late-Georgian town house with some of Dublin's finest Neoclassical interiors, featuring delicate plasterwork in the Adam manner by Michael Stapleton, Ireland's most accomplished follower of Robert Adam. Ely House provides a perfect conclusion to the day's survey of Dublin's plasterwork traditions from Palladian through Rococo to Neoclassical.

Friday, 26 June — Russborough House, Co. Wicklow

Full Day Excursion

• Russborough House (Designed by Richard Castle (c. 1690–1751) with Francis Bindon (c. 1690–1765) for Joseph Leeson, 1st Earl of Milltown • Built 1741–1755 • Blessington, Co. Wicklow): Designed by Richard Castle and built 1741–55 for Joseph Leeson, 1st Earl of Milltown. Widely regarded as one of the most beautiful houses in Ireland, its 700-foot Palladian façade, flanking colonnades, and symmetrical wings overlook the Blessington Lakes and Wicklow Mountains.

Highlights

• Ornate Rococo stucco ceilings by the Lafranchini brothers
• The Beit Collection, works by Vermeer, Goya, Rubens, and Gainsborough
• West Indian mahogany furnishings throughout
• Guided house tour, woodland walk, and restored walled garden
• Lunch in the village of Blessington

Restaurant Recommendations:

• The Hairy Lemon - Link one of Dublin’s trendiest pubs (AWCD recommendation)

Optional: Saturday, June 27 — Waterford Excursion

• An optional full-day excursion to Waterford, Ireland's oldest city, including a visit to Waterford Castle and the world-famous House of Waterford Crystal, where students can observe the traditional craft of hand-cutting and blowing crystal, a decorative art with deep roots in the Georgian era of patronage and luxury goods.

MEET OUR INSTRUCTORS

Dr. Conor Lucey is Associate Professor of architectural history in the School of Art History and Cultural Policy at University College Dublin, Ireland. He is a Board Member of the Irish Georgian Foundation and of the Castletown Foundation, and a former President of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland (2017-2020). Dr Lucey sits on the editorial board of Vernacular Architecture and Irish Architectural & Decorative Studies journals.

An historian of eighteenth-century architecture and design, Conor’s recent monograph, Building Reputations: Architecture and the Artisan, 1750-1830 (Manchester University Press, 2018), was awarded the prestigious Alice Davis Hitchcock Medallion, granted annually by the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain for a book that “provides an outstanding contribution to the study or knowledge of architectural history.” A recent edited volume, entitled House and Home in Georgian Ireland: Spaces and Cultures of Domestic Life (Four Courts Press, 2022), examines how domestic space was shaped by diverse needs, motivations and identities.

Books:

2022: [as editor] House and Home in Georgian Ireland: Spaces and Cultures of Domestic Life

2018: Building Reputations: Architecture and the Artisan, 1750–1830

2012: [as co-editor] Decorative Plasterwork in Ireland and Europe: Ornament and the Early Modern Interior

2007: The Stapleton Collection, Designs for the Neoclassical Irish Interior

Terry Sullivan – Lecturer, Interior Design and Furniture History

Terry Sullivan is the lead educator and curator of the Neoclassical Interiors Program, with years of professional experience in classical and historically informed interiors. As founder of the Classical Architecture and Interiors Institute, she combines scholarly expertise and hands-on design practice to guide participants in understanding, analyzing, and applying classical design principles.

Terry served on the ICAA Mid-Atlantic Chapter Education Committee (2021-2023) and her work is endorsed by leading architects and curators, including Peter H. Miller, Hon. AIA, Anthony S. Barnes, FAIA, LEED AP, and Michael Patrick, AIA, making her programs a trusted source for professionals and scholars seeking expertise in neoclassical interiors. She developed and led AIA-accredited lectures for the Institute of Classical Architecture and Art (ICAA), collaborating with leading experts such as Dr. Conor Lucey and Patrick Baty. These online lectures include Decorative Plasterwork in Georgian Ireland and Britain (2022), The Use of Colour ca. 1700–1820 (2022), and Analysis of the Paint at Stowe House (2023), all contributing to professional AIA Building Arts credit.

In addition to lectures, Terry organized immersive period room tours with museum curators, offering participants firsthand experience of historic interiors such as the Lansdowne Dining Room Metropolitan Museum of Art (NY), Salon Doré at the Corcoran Gallery (Washington, DC), and the Green Room of the White House and Mount Vernon, VA. Her programs are praised for clarity, rigor, and the integration of architecture, interiors, and decorative arts.

PRACTICAL INFORMATION

Dates - Monday, June 22 – Friday, June 26, 2026 (Optional Saturday, June 27)

Location - Dublin, Ireland, with day excursions to Co. Kildare and Co. Wicklow

Lunch - 12pm - 1pm Daily

Transport - Walking in the city; coach provided for all day excursions outside Dublin

What to Wear - Comfortable walking shoes; be prepared for some stairs and varied weather

OUR PRICING

The programme is complemented by a vibrant social and cultural schedule, providing unique insights into local history, architecture, and design, while creating memorable experiences that extend beyond the classroom.

*The price below does not include tax.

$30 for a day, from 22 to 27 June

CONTACT & INFORMATION:

Classical Architecture and Interiors Institute
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 917.921.0167
Address: 745 Fifth Avenue, Suite 500, New York, New York 10151
www.classicalarchitectureandinteriors.institute