GOING FORWARD PHOTONIQUE WILL BE ADVERTISMENT FREE
GOING FORWARD PHOTONIQUE WILL BE ADVERTISMENT FREE
Originally Photographed April 2022
[[shortcode.limerick.0011]] THIS WAS MY SECOND VISIT TO THE CHURCH
The Urban Cartographer Presents:
Photographed By William Murphy Using A Sony A7RIV
Our Lady of The Rosary Parish stands out as one of the most distinctive mid-century ecclesiastical buildings in Ireland. First encountered by chance in 2017, it took until April 2022 to make a long-overdue return visit.
Arriving late in the afternoon following hours on the road in intense heat, the session proved challenging. Equipment overheated, colour balance shifted in the dusk light, and long hours brought on heat exhaustion. Yet the timing captured the church bathed in a warm evening glow. The approach along the tarmac avenue presented a striking contrast: mature ornamental cherry trees in delicate pink blossom flanking a beech hedge still clinging to its copper-brown winter coat, awaiting the fresh flush of May.
At first glance, the building defies conventional expectations of an Irish Roman Catholic church. With its dark horizontal weatherboarding, clean lines, and standalone timber-clad campanile, it feels closer to Scandinavian modernism or an Italianate bell tower than traditional gothic revival. Depending on the shifting sun, the creosoted timber siding hovers mysteriously between jet black and dark charred brown.
Erected in 1950 as a chapel of ease to St Munchin’s Parish and officially opened by Bishop Patrick O’Neill in December of that year, the church represents a bold post-war departure in Irish architecture. Designed by the celebrated architectural partnership of Frank Corr and Liam McCormick and constructed by P. Molloy & Sons, it was originally conceived as a semi-permanent, demountable structure. Built with a welded light steel frame and creosoted weatherboards, it could be rapidly erected and, if necessary, dismantled and relocated as suburban residential growth shifted. The structure was subsequently extended in 1955 and rebuilt with brick faced in matching timber after a sacristy fire in 1976.
Beyond its striking structural form, the church occupies a significant position in twentieth-century Irish ecclesiastical art. The detached bell tower features a high-relief carved teak figure of Our Lady by celebrated sculptor Oisín Kelly. Inside, the building houses an exceptional treasury of sacred craftsmanship, including an altar frontal carved by Bríd Rynne, a beaten copper tabernacle by Brother Benedict Tutty of Glenstal Abbey, stained glass by Evie Hone and Mayer of Munich, and Stations of the Cross carved by the Passion Play craftsmen of Oberammergau.