Dublin’s once famous Ormond Hotel featured in the Sirens episode of James Joyce’s famous Ulysses.
Much changed during the 20th century after visits by James Joyce and his famous fictional character Leopold Bloom, the hotel became derelict in the early 21st century, over 100 years after Bloom made his journey across Dublin on 16th June 1904.
The hotel was built in the 1840s and became well-known, enough for Joyce to base part of Ulysses here. But the intervening years have not been kind or sympathetic to either the original layout or the hotel as it was when Joyce visited after it had been enlarged in 1910. Ulysses was published in 1920 although it was set in 1904.
There has, nevertheless, been a campaign to retain the buildings as they are and indeed one of the planning conditions are that the building, after construction must operate as a hotel and retain the name Ormond Hotel.
Numbers 7 to 11 are due to be removed but no. 7 on the right still remains, bedecked in ‘Do Not Remove’ graffiti, which is also referenced in this large piece of street art.
To the right, in this image you can see Number 6 which is a protected structure and dates to 1686 just a decade after Ormond Quay was reclaimed from the river and its marshy edges.
To the left, numbers 12 and 13 are protected structures dating from the early part of the 18th century and will form part of the hotel redevelopment but have to be incorporated into the new development.
There is no doubt that the Ormond Hotel was an important and historic part of Dublin’s old and modern fabric, but there is also no doubt that the building had become an eyesore in recent decades.
The best course of action to prevent urban decay, and there is a lot of decay and degeneration in Ireland, not just in Dublin, is to prevent key buildings such as the Ormond Hotel from becoming disused and dilapidated in the first place.
The redevelopment of the Ormond Hotel was due to be finished in 2020, but it is still nowhere near getting off the ground in what seems like an appropriately epic story.
