Review of the Year

As another year draws to a close, we thought it would be good to look back at the highlights of the year, whether community events, festivals, new arrivals or the many improvements being made to the area. Remember you’re still in Dublin’s very best neighbourhood!

Happy Birthday To Ya!

The city’s most visited visitor attraction, The Guinness Storehouse, marked its 25th Anniversary in 2025. The Storehouse opened is pint-shaped experience with the iconic bar on top in 2000, and since then has welcomed over 25m visitors, including high profile visits from royalty, presidents and celebrities. The Guinness Storehouse ended its Silver Anniversary with a huge birthday party.

Also marking 10 years is the Teeling Distillery on Newmarket. Their decade-long presence on Newmarket has seen the historic urban space transformed and the distillery has also become one of the city’s premier visitor draws. Teelings also welcomed its 1,000,000th visitor in the summer.

Culture Vultures

The Liberties’ fantastic culture offer continued to grow in 2025. In May, Culture Date With Dublin 8 served up its 7th edition with a week-long jamboree across Dublin’s most iconic postcode. Over 180 events, supported by 100+ partners were held, drawing a record 12,500 audience. Its made for a memorable week in May with everything from set-piece events marking the 250th Anniversary of the birth of Daniel O’Connell, an expanded evening showcase called Late in D8, walks and talks galore, a special exhibition on the work of William ‘Billy’ Mooney and specially curated tours and visits to many of the area’s best known sights and attractions.

Meanwhile, the city’s oldest community arts festival – The Liberties Festival – followed up with a packed week of fun, arts, performance and firm favorites in July. The festival is now in its 55th year and continues to showcase the very best of community life in The Liberties. Its programme has been recently reinvigorated by a new festival team.

Add in a busy Heritage Week in August, the new and eclectic Rialto Arts Festival and city staples such as St. Patrick’s Festival, Culture Night and Open House Dublin and it made for a vibrant cultural 2025 in The Liberties.

Going Green

By year end, Dublin City Council had  completed work to refurbish the small playground alongside Michael Mallin House on Vicar Street. A new mini-park has been created with two timber-clad circular areas – one for seating and the other with play features – together with new trees and soft planting. Designed by Haslam & Co Architects, the new parklet will provide a place to relax and meet and bring some much needed greenery to Vicar Street.

The area continues to get greener! The work of recent years has transformed streets like Francis Street with lush greenery in spring and summer time, and the impacts are regularly commented on. St Luke’s Avenue, which was previously criticized for its grey appearance is now transformed with tree planting and gardens. Also this year impactful planting schemes were completed in The Tenters, at Weavers Street, in some of the streets in Dolphin’s Barn and at Donore Avenue. Plans are afoot for tree planting at Carman’s Hall in the new year. The Liberties is getting greener!

Da Doo Run Run Run!

The Liberties Running Club was established in later 2024 by locals David Shanahan, Lisa Kelleher and Jenny Jones to encourage people to get out and get active! The club has grow hugely since its inception and in 2025 you couldn’t help notice some of its amazing events – packing Meath Street with energetic runners decked out in their distinctive blue vests featuring Liberties icons. The Running Club has introduced a whole new cohort to running and participated in many of the city’s big race meets, including the new Liberties 5km Run and the Dublin City Marathon. An inspiring success story!

Market Life

July saw the welcome return of the Newmarket Flea. The revived market held three pilot runs between July and September testing the waters for what’s hoped to be the return of regular  markets in 2026. 30+ stallholders brought the famous buzz of the Flea to a new look Newmarket.

Markets continue to grow and thrive across the area with the monthly We Love Markets packing in the punters at The Digital Hub, including evening markets. The Libertine Crawl is also now a monthly fixture, showcasing great arts and crafts across four famous Liberties’ watering holes. There’s a weekly Book Market in St Patrick’s Park and regular indoor markets at The Circular in Rialto. And of course, the Grand Ole Dame of them all, The Liberty Market, is still the beating heart of Meath Street.

Reinvigorating Public Spaces

The rejuvenation of Newmarket has been one of the area’s big transformations in 2025. Generous new pedestrian space has been provided, new links and connections made, traffic and parking has been reduced, and the square has become a more inviting destination. The work continues in the New Year with the arrival of planting, seats and other furniture. 2025 also saw the completion of the last major site on the square, 18 Newmarket – a new apartment building.

Meanwhile after a couple of messy months in the summer as Uisce Éireann completed work on a major upgrade of water infrastructure on Meath Street, the focus now shifts to the street renewal scheme, which is expected to begin at the start of next year. Meath Street will see a multi-million euro revamp with widened footpaths, new trees, seats and other amenities, space for outdoor markets, cafe terraces and street buzz.

Smarter and Healthier in 2025

Smart D8, the smart district dedicated to addressing community health and well being in the heart of Dublin 8 continued its success in 2025 with a host of new pilots projects supporting everything from cancer diagnosis to men’s mental health  The programme also supported an extensive programme of well being in the community events including women’s wellness, getting outdoors with nature, free blood pressure checks and more.

One of this year’s pilots projects, D8 Astro Football, has tackled one of the area’s persistent topics, the lack of organised games in football pitches in The Liberties, leading to underuse and the perception of a lack of facilities. D8 Astro Football uses easy access games to encourage men to get more active and to promote positive mental health.

Smart D8’s Showcase event in October explored themes ranging from heart health, men’s health, early-stage cancer detection, disability support access and virtual care pathways with speakers from the Smart D8 2024 and 2025 pilot calls.

Comings & Goings

The Liberties continues to be a great location for small business. 2025 saw the arrival of Ada Cafe on Thomas Street, a new ‘sit in’ Bakeology on Meath Street, the return of Variety Jones on Thomas Street, and Killian McNulty Interiors on Francis Street. Some Neck Guitars decamped to a swanky new premises on Francis Street, while newbie Papermint Store took its old premises on Dean Street. The year ends with good news for two venues, both impacted by fires in recent years: Drop Dead Twice on Francis Street will reopen shortly after  a major refurb, while Love Tempo will feel the love once more on Thomas Street in the new year.

However the year was not without its departures, and the sad news arrived in January that the well-known street trader Kathleen Farrell had passed away after a short illness. Kathleen had been a fixture on the corner of Thomas Street and Meath Street for decades: one of the last regular street traders in the area. An undeniable Liberties legend: never short of sound bite for the cameras or marching orders for the City Council staff that passed her stall each day.  She is sadly missed.