Journal of Architectural Conservation
Volume 17, Issue 1, March 2011
Headfort: A Robert Adam Designed House Interior Rediscovered
Richard Ireland and David Gundry
Paper Summary
Headfort House contains the Republic of Ireland’s last remaining suite of interiors designed by Robert Adam. There have been substantial maintenance issues over the last fifty years, and as a result the building was included on the World Monument Fund’s 2004 Watch List. Once these issues were resolved, attention moved to investigating and understanding the painted interiors which survived in good condition. This process led to an extensive physical investigation revealing an original decoration which is both striking and unusual and which due to the significance of the original scheme, as opposed to later over-painting, was eventually restored in two principal areas – the Stair Hall and Eating Parlour. The use of colour on the decorative plasterwork at Headfort reinforces the imperative of not making assumptions based upon either Adam’s surviving drawings or modern taste when commissioning or undertaking documentary and physical research of eighteenth-century interiors.
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Figure 14 Detail showing the unusual treatment of dentils, waterleaf, entablature soffit, column, capital and picture frame in the lower left of the picture.
Figure 15 Detail showing the extensive picking-out of the plasterwork above the end wall picture frame in the Eating Parlour.
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Richard Ireland BA (Hons) FRSA
Richard Ireland is a conservation consultant and practitioner for the repair, conservation and restoration of decorative plaster, architectural paintwork, wall and ceiling paintings. He is the recipient of the City & Guilds premiere Silver Medal for Advanced Decorating and works extensively throughout the UK and Ireland.
David Gundry BA (Hons), Pg.Dip.Build.Cons. (AA)
David Gundry has been employed at World Monuments Fund Britain since 2005 and is responsible for the organization’s projects within the British Isles and at other sites which have a specific relationship to British heritage. David gained a City & Guilds Advanced Craft Diploma (Stonemasonry), a Post-Graduate Diploma in Historic Building Conservation (The Architectural Association, 2004) and has attended ICCROM in Rome.
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