TD 1
As you pass the prison, along the road into one o
f the world’s coolest neighborhoods, a derelict block looms over Blessington Street Basin, separate from the red brickwork that otherwise describe the environs. Pocked gray stone, weather stained and worn, broken wood, shutters overlaid with graffiti pinned with legal notices and bright new MDF boards emblazoned with the call to Free Palestine. Along with what seems like about a third of Dublin, the structure has been left to fall apart. A number of these shops were busy until the beginning of 2019, when they were told to vacate their premises. Some, like Supply Hub, all but disappearing, and others like Gents of Dublin moving up the road, close to the custom they had built over their years working the shopfronts. The collapsing property that once housed Des Kellys showroom is one of the spaces owned by Garvagh Homes Limited, who were recently refused planning permission for “overcomplicated and fussy” luxury apartments in Malahide. Northern Irish developer Padraig Drayne, director of the firm, also owns half of the Jervis Shopping Centre as JSC, a company he and partner Paddy McKillen have registered in the Isle of Man. Similar plans for an apartment development here face rabid local opposition. In recent weeks, studios like the Icon Factory have had to shut their doors as D-Light is scrambling for survival. Sweeneys is now some sort of tourist trad bar. The pandemic was a deathblow for so many creative spaces, self-sufficient hubs of culture and inclusivity like Jigsaw and Baba Jaja. We find ourselves fighting for institutions like The Cobblestone to stand in the face of yet another hotel. While the government responds characteristically slowly to address uncomplicated issues, as a new creative community flourishes in the wake of the pandemic, it seems the spaces that facilitated the expression of that creativity are dying, and with it, the city. 16 “And the Wee Stores used to open on a Sunday. Because they were Prods. They’d open and sell the newspapers, while all the Catholic stores were closed.”