Gothic (Building Castles in post-Union Ireland)

Castles speak. Especially in an age when they are no longer necessary. The act of union of 1800, which brought Ireland into closer association with Britain, challenged the status of Irish landed proprietors, and not a few responded by building castles. In Gothic: Building castles in post-Union Ireland Judith Hill explores the projects of two Irish proprietors: the Burys, later Lord and Lady Charleville who commissioned Francis Johnston, then Ireland’ s most important architect, to design Charleville Castle; and Lawrence Parsons, later 2nd earl of Rosse, who re-imagined 17th-century Parsonstown House as early 19th-century Birr Castle. In this fascinating new book Judith Hill investigates Georgian Gothic in its own terms as both a British and Irish phenomenon, demonstrating how antiquarian understanding, associative thinking, awareness of family pedigree and historisised design ideas resulted in a uniquely Irish response to the Gothic revival. Using the ample surviving archives related to both families, she argues that these architecturally original and significant castles eloquently expressed their builders’ political and social concerns, making them artefacts of cultural unionism.