Most miserable and grim towns and villages in Ireland

Ah these things always lead to parochial rubbish.....
but having said that......



Glanmire....kip...

[Deleted User] wrote: »

DUBLIN
biggest sh*thole in Ireland.

And here come the stick boot into Dublin or Cork anti urban / or anti rural posts ...

/end of thread.

Personally, I don’t see much difference between Irish towns and the mixture of towns in say Western France also you’ve a LOT of run down towns in parts of England when you get away from the population density and popular showcase areas with big volumes of tourism. Try some of the coastal seaside resorts up around the north of England for places that have had their day.

We do have a different history to many of or neighbours and economic prosperity came later.

That story isn’t all that different in say Norway or Iceland though, both of which weren’t very well off at all until relatively more recently and I think we do have a big influence from North American and other “new world” philosophies about development in the mix too. So things can look a bit more utilitarian or brash at times.

I wouldn’t write off Irish towns though as universally grim. Many of them are very nice. They’re different in the sense they’re often very colourful and vibrant and I think we have our own aesthetic which isn’t one to be written off. Ireland is not Italy, France or Spain. We don’t have grand renaissance architecture. We have some decent stuff though here and there and the cities, low key as they are, are generally fairly pleasant and nice.

I think we can also naval gaze a lot and declare ourselves a kip when we aren’t. I always find Ireland more impressive when I’ve been away for a few months. You come back and it can be quite surprising how it feels clean, tidy, bright and stuff feels high quality.

When you’re here for months in the drizzle you notice the every crack in the pavement.

The other thing I have noticed, living in both France and Spain is when the sunshine goes away, a lot of the towns take on a grim, damp stone miserable vibe for the winter. Irish towns and houses are definitely built for wet weather and look much more cheerful in drizzle. It’s the same in Scandinavia / Nordic regions too. The houses are bright and cheery.

I know when I spent some time up in Iceland a French colleague of mine was complaining that everything was made out of painted corrugated steel. They tend to historically clad buildings with steel and paint things bright colours. She thought it was tacky. I thought it was just how they do things in Iceland. It works. It’s warm and it reflects the history of the place and the resources they had and I quite liked it. It’s very bright and cheerful. Reykjavik isn’t going to look like Paris or Nice, but if it did it would be a very boring world.

Different places are ... different. They all have their charm though.

whisky_galore wrote: »

We excel at uglifying some of our towns and villages it has to be said. Acres of really sh1t looking pvc windows and doors, faux concrete Classical columns and pediments around doors.
Awful gerry built attic conversions sprouting out of rooftops. There have been really pretty 19th pub fronts and shopfronts hacked away to conform to smooth plastered or pebble dashed pvc glazed blandness.

Try a typical village in the West of France. Lovely little core of a historic street or two in some cases and a love affair with ugly, usually white, pvc clad roller shutters that are kept closed most of the time, giving the place a look of being closed down with tumble weed rolling through.

In contrast, most Irish villages feel open and alive, even the ones with relatively slow economies. There’s usually some mad quirky cafe and a pub even if they’re tiny.

I think people are just pointing at particularly run down dumps of towns, which are unfortunately, a feature of every country I’ve ever been in and tend to be places people have moved away from, for obvious reasons.

There are equally plenty of small, vibrant ambitious places full of life in Ireland too.

I just find we have a tendency to go into “only in Ireland” mode and also comparisons between London and some half dead depressed hamlet someone escaped. That doesn’t mean every town and village in Ireland is like that. It’s just someone’s experience of leaving a one horse town, a subject of endless coming of age stories, novels, films and songs from all over the world.

There are Hicksvilles everywhere!

Clara Co Offaly. Grim.