Saor Ollscoil na hÉireann

Attached multiple-bay two-storey coach house, built c.1800, for adjoining house to south, comprising three-bay two-storey block to south, lower block attached to north gable of this, and single-storey addition to north elevation of this. Pitched and hipped slate roofs, and cast-iron rainwater goods. Brown brick eaves course. Red brick walls, partly rendered and painted. Square-headed window openings with brick voussoirs, cut granite sills and two-over-two pane timber sash windows. Yard entrance to south-east having square-profile red brick gate piers, having carved granite ball finial with rusticated band, recent steel gates.

This complex of early nineteenth-century coach houses is directly associated with the large house attached to its south elevation. No.55 Prussia Street was a grand eighteenth-century mansion, owned by the Steevens family until it was acquired by John Jameson of Jameson Distillery in 1804. The coach house accommodated horses and staff for the adjoining mansion. The buildings are present on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1837. The Thom’s Directory lists John Jameson of Jameson Distillery as the owner of no.55 in 1850, and lists no.53 and no.54 as stables. The house and lands were sold to Dublin Corporation in 1862, who developed the gardens and adjoining lands as the city cattle mart (now Drumalee housing complex). The mansion became the City Arms Hotel at this time, until its closure in the early 1970s. The coach house acts as a reminder of the former grandeur of the house and the necessity for accommodation for horses and staff.