Click on a photo above to view a larger version and description.

Introduction

Longford is a characteristic Irish county town and the cathedral town of the Catholic Diocese of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise.

It owes its origin to the Castle of the O'Farrells of Annely, who also endowed a Dominican friary. The Castle, which was heavily reconstructed as a Georgian house of great charm, stood at the entrance to the military barracks, terminating the vista, both from Main Street and the Church of Ireland church to great effect until its regrettable demolition, only in the mid 20th century, an architectural loss, which remains both tragic and irreparable. Nothing remains of the Dominican Friary.

The town is distinguished by the presence of St. Mel's Cathedral, begun to the design of Joseph Keane in 1840. While the portico lacks the sophistication of Keane's great Dominican Pope's Quay Church in Cork, the interior, by contrast, is now regarded as noblest of all Irish Classical church interiors. It is designed in the style of an early Christian basilica, with noble Grecian Ionic columns and a curved apse. It also shares the remarkable distinction of being the only major Catholic Church in Ireland to have actually been improved by internal reordering, when the fussy later altar was removed and replaced by a simple modem table altar, which accords harmoniously with the early Christian style of the interior. The tower and portico give a striking approach to the town from Dublin.

While Longford would never be categorised among the list of historic Irish towns, it does possess a Main Street as handsome as any, defined by good solid commercial buildings, three attractive banks and the prominently sited and now, inexcusably derelict, Courthouse. Longford has the unenviable distinction of getting the lowest marks for a town of its size in the recent National Tidy Towns competition. This is, however, only one reflection of a wider failure to manage and enhance its potential. It is difficult to find any Irish town more adversely affected by poorly designed advertising structures and signage. The shift of commercial focus of the town to the Ballymahon Street end of the Main Street and the development of the new shopping centre has also created an area of dereliction around the bridge, unprecedented in a Main Street of any other Irish town.

Apart from an overall poor level of signage design, the town also suffers seriously from the loss of the architectural character of older building stock through removal of timber sash windows and their replacement with top hung, outward opening, uPVC frames. uPVC has even penetrated to the Church of Ireland church.

Despite this, the basic shape and build fabric of the town remains strong and of an underlying solid and well-proportioned early 19th century character. If serious design and townscape initiative were to be set in motion to remove the most poorly designed examples of excessive signage and advertising, to tackle and properly restore a dozen or so of the worst derelict buildings and to restore original timber sashes to all of the most prominent buildings in the town, then its appearance would be most dramatically restored and enhanced. Such a programme could also be combined with improved paving, landscaping and new lighting and street furniture, which should aim to be designed in a simple and well detailed modem style without resorting to the English mock Dickensian gas lamps, which have been so ill advisedly used in other locations in Ireland.