1. A Private Residence (1754-1815)

This section contains the drawings of the architects Richard Castle (also known as Cassels) and Isaac Ware, as well as the drawings of the stuccodore Filippo Lafranchini and an anonymous furniture designer. The exhibition draws on these records to tell the story of the architecture of Leinster House.

These drawings were part of a collection of sixty original eighteenth-century architectural drawings acquired by the Hon. Desmond Guinness and his first wife, Mariga, in 1958. In 1996 the Guinness Drawings Collection was transferred to the Irish Architectural Archive, where they are still held today. 

Cumulatively, these drawings – in number, in quality of draughtsmanship, and in evidential value – form a unique group, the largest body of such material relating to any eighteenth-century Dublin townhouse.