Wonderful Barn

Freestanding single-bay five-stage grain store, dated 1743, on a cruciform plan with series of four single-bay single-storey gabled projecting bays. Now disused. Flat roof behind parapet approached by flight of ninety-four cut-limestone steps. Part creeper- or ivy-covered slate hung (lower stages) or lime rendered (upper stages) battered walls with rough faced cut-limestone stringcourses including rough faced cut-limestone stringcourse supporting battlemented parapet having cut-limestone coping. Square-headed door opening (west) below cut-limestone date stone ("1743") with lintel framing timber boarded double doors. Triangular window openings (upper stages) with rough faced cut-limestone sill courses, and concealed dressings with monolithic hood mouldings framing fixed-pane fittings. Interior with limewashed red brick English bond dome vaulted chambers. Set in unkempt grounds.

A grain store 'EXECUT'D BY JOHN GLINn' representing an important component of the eighteenth-century built heritage of County Kildare with the architectural value of the composition, one allegedly erected by Katherine Conolly (née Conyngham) (1662-1752) as a relief scheme in response to the so-called "Black Spring" (1741), confirmed by such attributes as the cruciform footprint; the conical silhouette; the "loop"-like openings; and the parapeted summit doubling as a "crow's nest" or viewing platform commanding panoramic vistas back to Castletown and the Conolly Obelisk. A prolonged period of neglect notwithstanding, the form and massing survive intact together with substantial quantities of the original fabric, both to the exterior and to the interior, including a partial slate hung surface finish: meanwhile, limewashed dome vaulted chambers pinpoint the engineering or technical dexterity of a grain store forming the centrepiece of a self-contained group alongside adjacent dovecotes (----) with the resulting ensemble making a picturesque visual statement in a rural street scene.