From top: Friends on My Mind – Signed A3 print by Tara O’Brien; The Bernard Shaw – A3 print by Maxi; Two for Joy – signed A3 archival print by Claudine O’ Sullivan; Stoneybatter – A3 print by Maxi; Five In A Row – A3 print by Maxi; Please Don’t Kill Me – signed print by Fuchsia Macaree; Planet Earth – signed A3 digital print by Jacob Stack; Dublin Lamps and Birds print on original 1880’s encyclopaedia page by Pat Byrne; Always Be Different A3 print By Mark Conlan and Dublin Pubs – A3 print by Maxi.
Prints from Irish artists at Dublin-based Jam Art Prints.
Perfect stocking fillers!
Mark at Jam Art writes:
We would like to give Broadsheet readers a chance to win a number of our pieces in a Jam Art giveaway
The winner will have the choice of picking 5 prints from the above selection!
To enter and to coincide with the Dublin Pubs print by Maxi (above), Broadsheet readers need to tell us the best boozer to spend a Christmas Eve and why?
Lines MUST close at 6am [Thursday].
Irish-made stocking fillers to broadsheet@broadsheet.ie marked ‘Irish-Made Stocking Fillers’. No fee.
Hipster art needs to die.
Imagine having so little going on in your life as to feel the need to dictate to people what they should and shouldn’t like…
many a Christmas evening was spent in the Longstone (sadly now gone), lots of nooks to chat in, plenty warm and nice food available. Had my first date with my now wife there a few winters ago too so fond memories.
Love the 5 Lamps one.
(No, you go and hang YOUR bóllix off them)
can we not have a NAME THOSE DUBLIN PUBS competition?
Better still, ‘BLAME those Dublin Pubs’
for married couples who had their first date/meeting within their walls.
single, hoop?
Single and proud.
just teasing
It was the puns, wasn’t it?
I’m not suggesting a specific one, but rather an ideal which does exist at a few locations, and which I have no intention of spoiling their charm by listing:
A village pub where the proprietor is behind the bar and draws your pint from a barrel just below the counter.
There’s a real fire in the grate, a mixture of logs…and turf for the aroma.
The clientele are all ages and backgrounds. The solicitor from up the street is in deep conversation with a small farmer from just outside the village.
There’s a modest TV, strictly for news and major sporting occasions.
There is a complete absence of background music, except possibly a bit of shush for the news on the radio.
Any paraphernalia used as decoration are genuine local items once used in that very premises – as opposed to kitsch pseudo junk sourced from some interior decoration warehouse.
It may not open until five or six and is all the better for that. The host is well rested and fresh for the evening to come – and there’s less likelihood of a resident bore who’s been sipping since lunchtime.
A few old photos on the wall may even include yourself and a few friends…alongside some newspaper-cuttings patched with selotape and yellow with age.
There are no cutesy signs such as “A stranger is just a friend you haven’t met”.
There may be impromptu music sessions featuring some local musicians who’ll be happy to let the well-behaved join in – but there will be no amplification.
Closing time is solely at the discretion of the boss.
Now, tell me you wouldn’t like to spend Christmas evening there.
sounds like a secret sex club
“A stranger is just a friend you haven’t bummed into madness”.
LOL there is something alluringly sexy about it!
That Pub would have everything. I know a few that have some, but not all of that, and they’re a welcome break from the Boom Boom Boom of sh1te ‘pop’ music.
I was in south Wexford a few weeks ago and went into a very nice cozy- looking pub in a very small village. Inside it was really nice until i saw all along one wall there were televisions, all on different channels with mostly horse racing and football on. I counted seven 50” screens side by side on one wall. All turned on.
Pity.
I know a pub exactly like that one
Finches in Neilstown?
The Royal Oak used to be like that but now while it looks the same, it’s packed full of Trendy loud talkers who all have to bring their dog to the pub.
Originally I used to meet all my friends on Christmas eve in McDaids then we’d stroll down to, the long gone now, Suffolk on Suffolk St, where we would literally have a lock in, or to be be more precise, a ‘keep them out’ …times were very different then, many pubs either closed at 8.30pm or didn’t open at all and getting a taxi home ( no nitelink) was a rite of passage you only endured once, which meant standing in a queue of 60 whilst invariably getting pissed on from above as the heavens always opened on Christmas eve.
I walked the 9km home for many years…like a stupidly happy drowned rat.
Strangely enough, I miss those times immensely but I’m sure that’s just down to a yearning for my youth and not a bygone era that jn comparison to today, Dublin then, was practically a third world city…and we loved it regardless.
These days, and for the sake of this competition, I do my reminiscing and meeting of friends at one end of the bar in the Long Hall…because, well it’s the Long Hall, nothing about the place has changed since I first walked in there 34 years ago, praying we would be served and not ejected back out into the lashing rain…you could be refused for merely having long hair then, god knows what they’d have done to you if you turned up with a nose ring, or sporting a frock.
So, nothing has changed bar the staff , who have gotten younger and friendlier over the years, not something you can say about all city centre pubs unfortunately.
I’m primarily an irish whiskey and Guinness person myself and they serve both to a more than acceptable standard whomever you ask,so theres no Guinness lottery at play staff wise, which is a always welcome.
But where they really excel during those frantic and freezing evenings in the run up to Christmas Eve, is their unflappable restraint to the rolling of eyes when asked for a hot whiskey …a thing of beauty in the month of December….no matter how busy, they take their time and make them just right.
Maybe they agree with me that a hot whiskey is not merely a drink, but rather the spirit and warm glow of Christmas in a glass.
So, it’s the Long Hall for me …..and the ghost of Phil Lynott leaning over the counter singing Old Town.
winner. the prints and a booker prize for Itchysays!
It has to be Nearys of Chatham St. It’s the perfect setting for creamy pints after grabbing a few last minute Christmas presents. Sitting down there to finally relax after all the December madness is unbeatable.
Walsh’s in Stoneybatter- a grand cosy spot. Free cheeseboards on a Tuesday too so it’d brie a great shout for Christmas Eve!
Cronins Bar and Lounge in Ballinagh, Co. Cavan as I have very happy memories of being there with many loved ones and much loved times.
I love The Goat Grill in Goatstown. Always a buzzing atmosphere great service, tasty food and a great pint. We go there every Christmas Eve and it is the best night of the year
On behalf of the Bingo Players of Ireland
Who are already the victims of overreacting regulation and gentrificating hipsters
Freehills in Crumlin Village
Eyes down 8pm Thursdays
Karaoke with Tony afterwards
Chip sangwiches at half time
Clickity Click
Jay…suzz you’re a brave gal V ! ;)
The Goat Bar and Grill. always filled with young and old all in a joyous festive mood.
The Headline as it is closest to home and really is becoming a wonderful Christmas Eve tradition.
Stags Head has long since been my go to Christmas Eve pub, I usually cut the shopping short, opt for books for presents and if you cant’ find books then vouchers will do the job. In previous years they have been open until 10 so plenty of time to put away a gallon of tasty Guinness to tide you over until the 26th. Season Greetings y’all!
I should get a commission the amount of clients I send there, handsome pub, staff a bit of craic, decent pint
It’s between Slattery’s in Rathmines and the Goat Grill in G-town as the go-to Christmas Eve pub. The first is the only pub in Dublin where you can go into the Gents and the lad next to you at the urinal tries to flog you two hundred head of cattle. The second offers Bailey’s flavoured De-Selection Boxes to all comers as a gesture of Good Will.
The Hole in the wall
Blackhorse Avenue
Just off the Phoenix Park this 400 year old pub it is a winter wonderland
Great Pints Food Atmosphere
The longest pub in Europe and it takes a lot of time to put up all those decorations
I love The Hole in the Wall too but the layout makes you feel like you’re always in someone’s way :)
hole in the wall is an odd place – way too many lads on their own, standing with pint in hand doing a little shoulder-jerk, hip-sway private bop thing for it to be right
an uneasy quietness
The Royal Oak, Kilmainham was great before they let dogs in.
Once upon a long ago, the greatest pub to be in was the local church for Midnight Mass! The smell of booze was enough to intoxicate any pioneer.
From,
A wide awake dad with new baby !
I remember bringing an unbaptized (so completely unfamiliar with churchy stuff) drunk Frenchman to a midnight service,
he freaked out, total panic attack in his inebriated state got a very cult vibe and went crashing down the aisle like pinball screaming save me, to vomit noisily outside. ..ah memories
I concur. We were all Michael Gove….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taqxVxSoOB8
The Royal Oak in Kilmainham, lovely atmosphere and right beside my house so I can stumble home in the wee hours :)
Slattery’s on Capel Street for me
surprised nobody’s mentioned grogan’s – the quintessential Christmas eve pub
I have an unshakeable love for the Dawson Lounge on a Christmas Eve.
Sure, there’s no elbow room to be had, shopping bags a-plenty underfoot and a stray fart could dispatch half the room…. but there’s something magic about the chats with friendly, festive strangers. Flushed cheeks and cold pints. Cramped into a tiny space with no excuse but share tables, stories and cheer with those that braved the madness of town (‘yer wan says Bono is around the corner!’) and found shelter together in that cosy cave!