14 Henrietta Street

Construction of Henrietta Street began in the 1720s, on land bought by Luke Gardiner.[3] Numbers 13, 14 and 15 were built in the late 1740s by Gardiner as a speculative enterprise.[4] Number 14's first occupant was Lord Richard Molesworth and his second wife Mary Jenney Usher.[5] Other notable residents in the late 18th century included Lord John Bowes, Sir Lucius O'Brien, Sir John Hotham, and Viscount Charles Dillon.[5]

After the Act of Union in 1800, Dublin entered a period of economic decline. 14 Henrietta Street was occupied by lawyers, courts and a barracks during the 19th century.[6] By 1877, a landlord called Thomas Vance had removed its grand staircase and divided it into 19 tenement flats of one, three and four rooms.[5] An advert in The Irish Times from 1877 read: "To be let to respectable families in a large house, Northside, recently papered, painted and filled up with every modern sanitary improvement, gas and wc on landings, Vartry Water, drying yard and a range with oven for each tenant; a large coachhouse, or workshop with apartments, to be let at the rere. Apply to the caretaker, 14 Henrietta St." By 1911, it was home to over 100 people.[6] The last families left the house in 1979.[6]

In the 1920s Irish Republican Army volunteer Thomas Bryan lived at the address. In March 2023 a plaque was unveiled by Dublin City Council in his memory.[7]

Restoration work began in 2006 and took over ten years to complete.[6] 14 Henrietta Street is owned and was restored by Dublin City Council, but is operated by the Dublin City Council Culture Company.[8] The house has been restored to show the original Georgian period through to its final incarnation as a tenement.[6]

• 
  Shelf of household products
• 
  Replica of a tenement living room

• Official website