Loftus Hall Closing This Year

Running costs must have been going through the roof.....

Sad to see it go, I live in Wexford and haven't visited it yet. Not sure if it was that busy.

Last year they charged to go in for a coffee, big mistake.

Azatadine wrote: »

Do you mean they charged entry before even buying a coffee? Jeez....

I'd love to see someone buy the place and do something with it but it would cost a big fortune to do it up I'd say.

A lot of people have tried there hand with it no luck.

Have just seen this thread now, and this is the first I've heard of this news. It's a real pity, as I was always fascinated by the place myself.

I do remember a piece in the local paper about five or six years ago where the current owner (from a farming family) said he actually bought the place mainly for the land that came with it. Can't find it online though.

An earlier piece (from 2011) says there were 63 acres and asking price was €625,000 so it was almost a case of "buy the land, and get the house for free", since €10,000 per acre wouldn't be unusual for agricultural land in most parts of Wexford:
https://www.independent.ie/regionals/newrossstandard/news/loftus-hall-price-slashed-27507170.html

Anyway, IIRC, the owner said that after buying the land, he thought he may as well try make a go of developing the house itself as an attraction too. I thought things were going fairly well there, but obviously not, if they're going to close. As I said, a real pity.

As regards what happens next, maybe they'll try sell the house, but keep the land. However, whether or not anybody else might take it on as a business venture obviously remains to be seen.

Well, there ya go. Coincidence that the story be posted so soon after I wondered about it.

Surprised that the land is up for sale too if that was a large part of his reason for buying it in the first place, but maybe I'm not actually remembering that rightly anyway.

Will be interesting to see if anybody buys or if it continues to be run as a tourist attraction in future.

TheTorment wrote: »

There'd be no shortage of land in that family.

As the sea breeze blows across it :pac:

I wouldn't claim to know the man myself, but he did show me around the place down there shortly after he opened it to visitors, in connection with something to do with my work. And because I'm interested in the place, I've generally kept an eye on news and other stuff about it (until I was late seeing maybe the biggest news of all here, that he's now planning to close it).

It struck me that he's a great man for spinning yarns about it to suit himself. For example, it's well known that the house where all the "quare stuff" happened was pulled down, and the current house was built around 1870, some 100 years later. But he claimed to have discovered documents that hadn't been seen for many years, that said the main door to the current house stands in exactly the same spot as the door to the previous one, and so you could still walk through the same doorway that the mysterious stranger did.

Should mention it was a fine hot summer's day when I was there. As he led me into what they call the card room and they claim stands on the same spot as where the "quare stuff" occurred, he asked "do you feel it getting colder the second you walk in here?".

Granted, it felt colder all right - but only because the shutters on the windows were closed there, while they were open everywhere else.

Also, while it was always known that there was a structure there since around the 14th century, he claimed in 2016 to have discovered other documents that pinpointed the exact date of the first structure being 1350. Rather fortunately, this meant he could announce a marketing plan for the 666th anniversary of the place.

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story, eh?

mobby wrote: »

That's a shame, they did a great job on the Gardens.

Just visited on Saturday and was very pleasantly surprised by the beautiful gardens.

Oh, I'm not criticising him for it at all. I'm also inclined to say more power to him, and fair play to him for making something of the place. No harm done if he happened to spin things a certain way to suit his own needs from time to time.

I actually had some of my first-ever pints in Loftus Hall myself. It was after my Leaving Cert in the summer of 1989, when I was still just 17 years old, and spending a few days camping in The Hook area with friends. Leaving Cert students today get a week or more in Magaluf or Ibiza, but back then, we were lucky to get three nights in a tent at the other end of County Wexford!

The gravestone of Canon Broaders is in Horetown Cemetery. It's close to 250 years old, so am not sure how legible anything on it actually is. Having said that, while several sources say it carries that epitaph, this one says that it doesn't have it at all:
http://www.abandonedireland.com/Loftus_Hall_2.html

I honestly don't know myself.

Incidentally, might be of interest to you or others that Ramsgrange Church still has his chalice, and it was in the news a few years back, when it was first stolen and then recovered:
https://www.independent.ie/regionals/wexfordpeople/news/exorcists-chalice-is-recovered-after-theft-27723217.html

I don't think it suffers from location. There were some 250,000 visits to the lighthouse in 2018, and even more in 2019, if these figures are to be believed:

https://www.independent.ie/regionals/newrossstandard/news/rising-tide-as-250000-visit-busy-lighthouse-37590832.html
https://wexfordtoday.com/2020/01/16/visitor-numbers-increase-at-hook-lighthouse-in-2019/

That's an awful lot of passing traffic, since you literally can't get to the lighthouse without passing by the gates of Loftus Hall.

Well, strictly speaking you can, if you happen to live in Slade or somewhere else along that road....but you know what I mean...!