www.lisdonagh.com (Tourist Accommodation Facility)
Open: May 1-Oct 31 2025
The 2025 Revenue list still hasn’t been published so today I am writing about Lisdonagh in County Galway. It is another tourist accommodation property that is only available as a whole house rental, so I don’t think I will be able to visit. There are also cottages available for accommodation – perhaps Stephen and I can stay there sometime!
The website tells us:
“When looking for an authentic Irish country house to hire, the beautiful 18th century early Georgian Heritage home is the perfect choice. Lisdonagh House is large enough to accommodate families, friends and groups for private gatherings. This private manor house is available for exclusive hire when planning your next vacation or special event. Enchantingly elegant, Lisdonagh Manor House in Galway has been lovingly restored and boasts original features as well as an extensive antiques collection. Peacefully set in secluded woodland surrounded by green fields and magnificent private lake, this luxury rental in Galway is full of traditional character and charm. The tasteful decor pays homage to the history of Lisdonagh Manor with rich and warm colours in each room. The private estate in Galway is perfect for family holidays, celebrations and Board of Director strategy meetings. Lisdonagh is an excellent base for touring Galway, Mayo and the Wild Atlantic Way.“
Lisdonagh Estate is set in its own mature woodland with private lake and guests may avail of complimentary horse riding, fishing in our lake and rambling walks through our 200 acres of Irish countryside.
I would love to be able to stay sometime!
The National Inventory of Architectural Heritage tells us it was built around 1760; Mark Bence-Jones estimated it to be from 1790s. [1] [2] A third date is suggested on the Visit Galway website which tells us that Lisdonagh House is an early Georgian country manor built around the 1720s by the Reddingtons for the St. George family who were prominent landlords in Galway. [3]
The Landed Estates website tells us:
“For fifty years in the middle of the 19th century a branch of the O’Flaherty family leased an estate at Lisdonagh, parish of Donaghpatrick, barony of Clare, county Galway, from the St. George family of Headford. Bernard O’Flaherty of Lisdonagh was agent to Peter Lynch of Ballycurran in the 1830s…In the 1870s Martin O’Flaherty of Lisdonagh owned 2,128 acres in county Galway. He married Mary O’Gorman and their daughter Eva, a founder member of Scoil Acla on Achill Island, was born in 1874. He sold his estate to Peter O’Mahony in the late 19th century and Lisdonagh passed to Henry Palmer of Galway, who married O’Mahony’s daughter. Their daughter Valda Palmer lived at Lisdonagh until the 1990s. In 1885 Martin Francis O’Flaherty was acting as a trustee for the estate of Edward Michael Davies, a bankrupt. Part of this estate at Moneyteigue, barony of Dunkellin, was offered for sale in the Landed Estates court in April 1885.” [4]
The Women’s Museum of Ireland tells us that Eva O’Flaherty studied millinery in Paris at the end of the 19th century, where she knew Countess Markievicz, and had a millinery emporium on Sloane Street, London, in 1913. Prior to World War I Eva was a well known beauty in the Café Royal, mixing with an eclectic intellectual artistic milieu, many of whom visited her in later years in Achill. Eva corresponded with Kathleen Clarke and other notable Republican women such as Dr Kathleen Lynn and Máire Comerford all her life. She moved to Achill in 1910, opening St Colman’s Knitting Industries in Dooagh which would proved much needed employment for local women for almost fifty years and co-founding Scoil Acla with poet, journalist and, later, politician, Darrell Figgis, Colm O’Loughlainn and Anita McMahon. [5]
“After her hectic experiences in Dublin, Eva settled back into life in Achill, where artist Paul Henry became a close friend and where writer Graham Green played cards regularly in her home. Such was Eva O’Flaherty’s contribution to the fledgling Irish state that President Eamon De Valera sent Senator Mark Killilea as his government representative to give the oration at her funeral in Donaghpatrick graveyard in April 1963. Her coffin was draped with a tricolour and she received military honours.” [5]
The house is two storeys over basement. It has five bays, with a central curved bow. The entrance doorway is in the bow, and has an arched fanlight over the door. The doorcase has limestone block-and-start surround, with a keystone in the form of a massive scroll bracket, and a further cornice above and limestone bracket above that in the form of a heraldic bird’s head, with the beak forming a ring for hanging a lantern. [see 1] The door is approached by flight of five limestone steps with wrought-iron railings.
Mark Bence-Jones tells us that on one side of the house is a detached pyramidally-roofed Palladian pavilion with a Venetian window on one face and a niche on the other. Bence-Jones adds that Dr. Craig is doubtful whether a balancing pavilion was ever built.
The house has commanding views over Lough Hackett, a private Lake which forms part of the Estate, and of Knochma hill.
The rear elevation is of three bays and three storeys, with a centre flat-roofed canted bay. This rear bay contains a round headed window with cobweb fanlight which lights the stairs.
Mark Bence-Jones writes in his A Guide to Irish Country Houses that the impressive front hall has walls painted with an Ionic order and figures in grisaille by J. Ryan. [2] The Lisdonagh website tells us that the murals depict the four virtues of valour, chastity, beauty and justice.
The staircase is behind this hall, partly in three sided projection.
The main rooms are beautifully furnished and look invitingly comfortable. The ground floor has a spacious drawing room with open fire, separate Georgian dining room, small study or reading room and fully equipped kitchen. Dining can be self catered or provided by your hosts on request. A sweeping original oak staircase leads to the first floor and 5 en-suite bedrooms with lake or garden views. There are an additional 4 en-suite bedrooms on the lower ground floor as well as Rafferty’s Room which is a stone clad snug with mini bar style facilities.
The bedrooms look equally enticing.
The National Inventory tells us that there is a detached eight-bay two-storey stable block, built c.1760, in yard ancillary to Lisdonagh House. At either end are plain gate piers with wrought-iron gates. The yard has a carriage arch and fountain.
It has two cottages for accommodation also.
As well as Lughasa Villa there is Inisfree Villa. On the ground floor there is a large sitting room with plush period furnishings and wood burning stove. A small but fully fitted galley kitchen is adjacent to the sitting room. Upstairs there are two bedrooms, one very spacious double bedroom and a twin bedroom – both en-suite.
There is a two-bay single-storey gate lodge of c.1830 on the opposite side of the road to the entrance gates, with lime-rendered walls and wide windows. The entrance is through the porch in the south return wall.
[2] Bence-Jones, Mark. A Guide to Irish Country Houses (originally published as Burke’s Guide to Country Houses volume 1 Ireland by Burke’s Peerage Ltd. 1978); Revised edition 1988 Constable and Company Ltd, London.
[3] https://visitgalway.ie/lisdonagh-house/
[4] http://landedestates.nuigalway.ie/LandedEstates/jsp/property-list.jsp?letter=L
[5] https://www.womensmuseumofireland.ie/blog/eva-oflaherty-achills-forgotten-heroine
Irish Historic Houses 