Nuala Corcoran

As a child, I would try to catch a glimpse inside anonymous houses, wondering what it looked like, who lives there? One of the projects which I undertook during my time studying Design History and Material Culture, explores a little house in Catherine Street, Dublin 8, notable for its unusually ornate facade. My research revealed the history of the Spitalfields housing scheme, the legacy of Dublin tenements and a little...just a little about who lived there.

My research revealed that the inhabitants were involved with saving their next door neighbours from a deadly house fire. Children were thrown from the window and caught, older residents had their fall broken by using the hall rug. Don't worry...everyone was saved! The original 1968 reports from the fire and the subsequent effort to gain a bravery award can be found in the National Archives.

The house was built in 1918, designed by Charles J. MacCarthy (1858-1947). One of a group of ten houses on the street. But this house stands out. There is a level of ornamentation on the building and in the window dressing which create a juxtaposition between the public and private liminal spaces. There is shy exhibitionism, grabbing your attention from the street, and yet the interior is tantalizingly shut behind its white door, the inside of the building is out of reach and inaccessible.

Your home is a private space, only those who are invited may enter. The window dressings were so ornate, with such pretty things sitting in the window, so carefully curated, that they represent the personality of the resident. Showing us keepsakes which hint at the lives of those who live there. I tried to reach out to the current resident but they did not respond, I did not get access to this house. My imagination had to fill in the furniture, colours and carpets of the mysterious interior.

As well as the essay which resulted from the research, my background in fine art lead me to make a series of mixed media prints which represented my response to the imagined interior of 13 Catherine Street.

 “There are oppositions that we regard as simple givens: for example, between 
 private space and public space, between family space and social space, 
 between cultural space and useful space, between space of leisure and that of 
 work. All these are still nurtured by the hidden presence of the sacred.” 

 Foucault, M. (1986) *Of Other Spaces*. P.23.