This is the last of the pre-Christmas shopping posts. I won’t go through the whole preamble again but will just say, as a quick reminder, that the emphasis in this series of posts is on: craft, home/handmade items, and independent shops. If you are entering the final run up to Christmas with some present shopping left to do, it would of course be lovely to stumble on a shop where you could scoop up diverse items to match all the gaps on your list. The Irish Design Shop, which carries a large range of items spanning different craft disciplines, is that sort of shop. Below are a few of the items they stock that caught my eye.
Tag Archives: Dublin
♥ Last Minute Christmas Shopping
Filed under Craft, Dublin, Shops/Shopping
♥ Light up a Life
Yesterday, Sunday, I went with my mum to Our Lady’s Hospice in Dublin for the annual Light up a Life ceremony. This remembrance ceremony has been held at the hospice every year, in early December, since 1992. From small beginnings in the early nineties it has mushroomed into an event attended yesterday by about 5000 people. Similar ceremonies are held at hospices all round the globe; because of the large numbers who attend it’s possible that the Dublin event is the largest Light up a Life gathering in the world.
♥ The School of Jewellery
I love jewellery. It’s not that I trip the light fantastic to high-end jewellery shops or high street chains to stock up on baskets of bling but rather that I am passionate about beautiful hand crafted pieces. I love looking at them in awe-struck wonder and appreciating the workmanship even if they are totally beyond my means. It is of course important that the skills that go into crafting these wonders tumble-down the generations, so as a lover of hand crafted jewellery I was pleased to learn that one of Ireland’s foremost practitioners of the art Deirdre O’Donnell is setting up a jewellery school in Dublin in 2012.
♥ Coffee in Dublin//Five: The Winding Stair
In an increasingly homogenous world what often best defines and sets a city apart (aside from architecture, ambiance, culture and language) is its collection of one-off shops which seek to echo some aspect of that city’s uniqueness. Dublin’s much loved bookshop The Winding Stair, which sells both new and second-hand books, is a gem of a shop that manages to evoke the ghosts of Dublin’s rich literary past and yet remain grounded in the 21st Century. The bookshop is on the ground floor of a building on Ormond Quay, in the centre of Dublin; the equally well-loved Winding Stair restaurant is on an upper floor.
♥ Coffee in Dublin//Four: Sixty Four Wine
It’s always good to know where to find a decent cup of coffee, so when I am in the Sandycove, Glasthule or Dun Laoghaire areas of South Dublin and in need of a caffeine pick-me-up, I head to Sixty Four Wine. The owner Gerard Maguire has woven together three different but related strands to come up with a successful business. Sixty Four is principally a wine emporium, so the front of the shop carries a large selection of vinous treats at every price point, in the middle there’s an artisan food section and at the back an interesting café (serving coffee, teas, breakfast and lunch) and a fine wine cellar.
The coffee is good and always arrives with a wedge of Valrhona chocolate on the side. The decor of the café is eclectic; a tiled floor, table tops made from the sides of wooden wine boxes, seating replete with comfortable cushion, quirky antiques, a bust of James Joyce in one corner and artificial lighting augmented by flickering tealights. The mix is curiously appealing and the café has a post-modern feel (I mean that in a very good way); the sort of place you wouldn’t be surprised to come upon a skilled scribe scribbling by the glow of candlelight.
The owner Gerard is living the mantra ‘do something you love and you will never have to work a day in your life.’ He started his working life as a policemen and then became a lawyer with his own practice. He is a long time lover of wine, so when he had a health scare several years ago he decided, as he waited a week for his test results, that if all was well he would work from that day on at something he loved, the news was good and Sixty Four Wine was born. Gerard is studying to become a Master of Wine; he is entering the third year of a seven-year long slog.
When I was talking to Gerard I couldn’t resist asking a would be Master of Wine to recommend a couple of wines at the €15 level and here’s what he suggested; a Godello (that’s a white wine, Godello is the grape variety, like clothes grapes go in and out of fashion and Gerard reckons that Godello is the coming thing) by the Spanish producer Rafael Palacios and Clos des Trias a bio-dynamic Grenache dominated red from the Ventoux.
Note: Sixty Four Wine is at 64 Sandycove Road, Glasthule, Co. Dublin and the web address is http://www.64wine.com
Filed under Coffee, Dublin, Food/Wine, Restaurants/Cafés
♥ Atypical Tourist
I happened upon the Happiness Project blog recently (click here), complete with its weekly suggestions for the Happiness Challenge 2011. I haven’t fully digested all that’s on it but one thing that caught my eye was the idea of becoming a tourist in your home area. Thus, I found myself in the centre of Dublin yesterday, an atypical tourist in my native city. My mission was to see the Book of Kells.
I headed to Trinity College, a university founded by Queen Elizabeth 1 in 1592. Once through the main gate, I was in a world far removed from the surrounding urban cacophony; a forty acre plus site filled with cobbled quads, ancient imperious grey-stoned building, grassy squares, centuries old trees and verdant playing fields. I was not alone as there was a long snaking but fortunately swift moving queue, waiting to get access to the library building where the Book of Kells is kept (I was there just after the 12 noon Sunday opening time, it’s apparently much quieter later in the afternoon).
In case you don’t know, the 9th Century Book of Kells is an exquisitely decorated copy of the four gospels in Latin, four pages of which are on display in a dimly lit room in the library building. There is an exhibition area, with displays explaining the background to the book and related manuscripts. The €9 admission charge to see the Book of Kells includes access to the extraordinary sixty-five metre Long Room which is the main chamber of the old library. The room is high ceilinged, with to-the-rafters oak shelves holding a mass of leather-bound first editions. White marble busts of famous philosophers, writers and others who have a connection with Trinity stand sentinel along the length of the room. In the center there are display cases in which some of the Long Room’s 200,000 books lay open (the display changes every few month).
I spoke to the very helpful Ken, one of the library’s staff. In a curious circular twist of fate Ken started his working life as a bookbinder and now many years later he again has a book-centric job (in between he has had various other non-book related employments). He loves his work in the library, especially the opportunity to meet and talk to people from all over the world. He has met the great and the good; Bruce Springsteen and Al Pacino visited separately on the same day, Ken says his fifteen-second claim to fame was asking Al Pacino to leave (nothing Al did, just that the fire alarm went off when he was there). A particular highlight for Ken was watching the Queen visit the Long Room on her recent trip to Ireland.
When I left Trinity’s grounds I headed to have a tourist-y Sunday brunch of a full Irish Breakfast before visiting the National Gallery (more about that in another post).
♥ Bake my Cake
What do you do if you qualified as an architect in Dublin, just as the world economy wobbled spectacularly, the Irish property market imploded and construction in Dublin lurched to a shuddering halt? When Catherine De Groot completed her degree in 2008, she briefly worked in an architectural practice but when her hours were cut, she decided to supplement her income by transforming her childhood passion for baking into a business. For a while she beavered away at the cake making plus the architecture but the fledgling baking business was so successful that she decided to leave architecture and in November 2010 she found a suitable premises and opened Bake My Cake.
The shop is on Booterstown Avenue in South Dublin, it’s long, narrow and the white-painted walls are a perfect foil to the splashes of colour supplied by: the shelves of brightly-hued products, the painted logo created by a graphic designer friend, the colour blocked take away coffee cups and the pretty polka dot cake boxes. The gorgeous baking aroma transfixed me the moment I walked through the door, it comes from the heart of the business,an open plan kitchen, at the back of the shop, overlooking a small garden.
The business has three distinct parts. Firstly there’s the baking side; should you be looking for a bespoke cake for a special occasion (wedding, birthday, christening…) you can sit down and talk to The Bake My Cake team and they will come up with a design that matches your requirements. There is also a list of deserts, cupcakes and other treats available to order. Secondly, if you are a devoted home baker the shop is a place where you can source all manner of cake-centric things such as: fondant icing, cake tins, colouring, cutters, edible food writing pens, cake decoration and cup cake cases. The third part of the Bake my Cake business is the treats section at the front of the shop where there is a daily changing choice of goodies (cup cakes, brownies…) as well as ice cream and coffee for sale (take out only).
A special thank you to Neil, one of Catherine’s team for answering all my question.
Note; Bake My Cake, 45 Booterstown Avenue,Blackrock, Co. Dublin. Website: http://www.bakemycake.ie Phone: 00353 1 2784478. The shop is open, Monday – Friday: 8.00a.m. – 6.00p.m. and Saturday: 10.00a.m. – 4.00p.m.
Filed under Cake, Celebrations, Dublin, Food/Wine, Shops/Shopping
♥ Favourite Shops//Bow
If I were a tourist in a foreign city Bow is exactly the sort of shop I would like to stumble upon; Dublin is fortunate to have this unique addition to the city’s retail landscape. Bow is co-owned by three talented people, Ellis Boyle (creator of ethereally pretty clothes), Margaret O’Rourke (jewellery designer and founder of her own label MoMuse) and Wendy Crawford (finder of vintage treasures). The mix in the shop is thus clothes, jewellery and vintage items.
Filed under Designers, Dublin, Fashion, Shops/Shopping, Style
♥ Thread
Thread is a new free fashion magazine for Dublin that will be published quarterly. It’s the very clever idea of the owners of six independent Dublin boutiques (Bow, Costume, Dolls, Indigo & Cloth, Smock and uCCa) who banded together to showcase their stock (often original and sometimes quirky) and to shine a light on Dublin’s vibrant creative fashion scene.
Filed under Designers, Dublin, Fashion, Shops/Shopping, Style
♥ Cornucopia
Cornucopia is the answer; the question was where do you eat in Dublin when you are detoxing. I only discovered it a few years ago but Cornucopia has been around for a quarter of a century, starting off as a health food shop with a few tables to the back for eating at, then morphing into a café/restaurant. Cornucopia has expanded over the years and now occupies the ground floor space of two building on Wicklow Street and there are plans to open the first and second floors of the buildings, later this year, for dining, catering and arts events.
Filed under Dublin, Food/Wine, Healthy Living, Restaurants/Cafés
Just Add Attitude
Just Add Attitude 