2003:511 - DUBLIN: 3–4 College Street, Dublin

A watching brief was carried out during redevelopment work in the basement of Nos 3–4 College Street, an 18th-century five-storey-over-basement office building, which is a protected structure. The building is located at College Green, which originally formed part of the eastern suburb of Viking Dublin. However, the cartographic evidence and the results of the watching brief suggest that the site lies within the old riverbed of the Liffey, which was active until about 1600, after which time the area was reclaimed. During the monitoring programme the basement slab was reduced by 0.5m but was found to sit directly on a coarse gravel deposit, originally associated with the river.

A cartographic source calls the site the ‘old shore’ in 1734, although it was probably reclaimed by this date, as a reference to a lease, dated to 1658, refers to building on ‘all that part of the strand . . . which abutteth . . . several houses and gardens belonging to Arthur Annesley, situated on the College Green . . . adjoining the seaside there’. By 1756 the site was occupied by a series of domestic houses which fronted onto Dame Street, but these were gone by the late 18th century, replaced with the present building. The building has a series of substantial basements, 3m in height and orientated north–south. The cellars are well preserved, the main walls constructed of limestone, mortared with a hard white mortar. A series of semi-groined brick arches form an attractive roof, but these are not bonded in with the main walls and are possibly not original.

The western cellar has brick fireplaces in the west wall, but these were inserted in the 19th century. A subterranean passageway, orientated east–west, runs along the front of the building, under the pavement along Dame Street. There are five square-headed entrances on the south side, which lead to small cellars under the road.