Portumna Castle

Portumna was built around 1618 for Richard Burke, fourth Earl of Clanricarde, and it marks a transition: a symmetrical Jacobean house with large mullioned windows and formal gardens, but still with corner towers, gun loops and a defended forecourt, built at a moment when Irish landowners were beginning to prefer comfort to defence without quite trusting it yet. It cost around ten thousand pounds, an enormous sum. A fire in 1826 gutted it and the family moved out; it stood as a roofless shell for over a century and a half. The Office of Public Works has been restoring it in stages since the 1970s - the ground floor and roof are done and open, the upper floors remain shells. Outside, the seventeenth-century walled kitchen garden has been replanted with period varieties and there are formal geometric gardens to the front. It stands beside Lough Derg with a forest park adjoining.

What you actually see

• The Jacobean front - symmetrical, mullioned, and still defended at the corners.
• The restored ground floor - roofed and open, with the upper floors still shells.
• The kitchen garden - the seventeenth-century walled garden, replanted.
• The formal gardens - geometric planting in front of the house.

When to go

April to September; it closes for winter. The gardens are best from June. An hour or two covers the house and gardens together.

Honest expectations

Only the ground floor is restored - the upper storeys are open shells, which surprises visitors expecting furnished rooms. Seasonal opening. Ticketed.

Nearby

Portumna Forest Park and Lough Derg are adjacent; Birr Castle is east.