Castletown House and Parklands

The house was built c.1722 for the speaker of the Irish House of Commons, William Conolly (1662- 1729) the designs of a number of important architects were used, notably Alessandro Gailiei, Sir Edward Lovett Pearce and later Sir William Chambers. The entire estate was sold by the Conolly-Carew family in 1965 to a property developer and in 1967 the house and some parkland were purchased by the Hon. Desmond Guinness. Both Mr Guinness and subsequently the Castletown Foundation, who acquired the house in 1979, devoted considerable effort and resources to maintaining the house and restoring the principal rooms to a high standard. Castletown was transferred to state care on 1 January 1994.

Castletown House, Ireland’s largest and most significant Palladian style country house, is a wonderful place to visit for a guided tour and can be used to support aspects of the primary curriculum outside the school environment in a number of different ways.

For more information and to arrange a visit go to Castletown House and Parklands.

The OPW offers free access to all OPW managed Heritage Sites to school-going children under their Free Schools Visits programme. This Programme is intended to support the educational curriculum and children can, with their teachers, engage with many relevant aspects of their learning including art, history and social science at these historic & heritage locations throughout the country.

Text and image courtesy of Heritage Ireland and Castletown House.