The Slow Ireland Series
A Self-Guided Walking Tour of Dublin
The route we send friends on their first morning in the city. Georgian doors, literary plaques, Marsh's Library, and a glass of wine on the north bank. Three unhurried hours, no guide, no group.
The Route At A Glance
Start at Trinity College Front Square. Walk south into Georgian Dublin through Merrion Square and the National Gallery, around St Stephen's Green, west to Marsh's Libraryand St Patrick's Cathedral, up to Christ Church, and cross the Ha'penny Bridge to finish at The Winding Stair.
The Eight Stops
- 0120 min
Trinity College Front Square
College Green
Start where the city starts. Walk into Front Square from College Green, stand under the Campanile, and look back at the Provost's House. The cobbles are the same ones Beckett, Wilde, and Swift crossed. Skip the Book of Kells queue on a first walk. You are here for the light on the stone.
Samuel Beckett read French here. Oliver Goldsmith is the statue on the left.
- 0230 min
Merrion Square
Georgian Dublin
Walk down Nassau Street, then Clare Street, into Merrion Square. This is the finest Georgian square in Europe that people still live on. Do a full loop. Count the door colours. Read the plaques. Oscar Wilde reclines on the rock in the northwest corner, watching Number One, the house where he grew up.
W. B. Yeats lived at Number 82. Sheridan Le Fanu at Number 70.
- 0345 min
The National Gallery
Merrion Square West
Free entry, always. Give it forty-five minutes, not more. Go straight to the Yeats room upstairs and the Vermeer downstairs. That is the whole visit. You are on a walk, not a museum crawl.
Jack B. Yeats is the painter. William Butler Yeats is the poet. Both are here in different rooms.
- 0425 min
St Stephen's Green
The Georgian Mile
Cross to Kildare Street, past Leinster House and the National Library. Enter the Green at the Fusiliers' Arch. Walk clockwise. Sit on a bench near the pond. This is where Dubliners actually eat lunch. Buskers on the bandstand in summer. Ducks in every season.
James Joyce studied at Newman House on the south side of the Green.
- 0520 min
Grafton Street & Powerscourt
South City
Leave the Green by the top gate onto Grafton Street. Walk it slowly, then duck into Powerscourt Townhouse. A Georgian mansion turned shopping arcade with a coffee balcony that few tourists find. The pastries at Pepper Pot are the pause your feet need.
Bewley's on Grafton Street was Joyce's café. The stained glass by Harry Clarke is still there.
- 0645 min
Marsh's Library & St Patrick's
The Liberties
Walk south on Aungier Street, then west toward St Patrick's Cathedral. Beside it, tucked behind a garden gate, is Marsh's Library, opened 1707, unchanged since. Cages you can lock yourself into for rare books. Small entry fee. Worth every euro. Then wander the cathedral where Swift was dean.
Jonathan Swift is buried inside St Patrick's, next to Stella. The Latin epitaph he wrote himself.
- 0730 min
Christ Church & Fishamble Street
Medieval Dublin
Up to Christ Church Cathedral. The old part of the city, older than the Georgian. Walk down Fishamble Street on the north side, one of Dublin's oldest streets. Handel's Messiah was premiered here in 1742. A plaque marks the spot. The city noise falls away for a block.
Fishamble Street is where Molly Bloom's father grew up in Ulysses.
- 0840 min
The Winding Stair & the Liffey
North Bank
Cross the Ha'penny Bridge. Directly ahead is The Winding Stair, a bookshop above a restaurant, both worth an hour. Buy a slim volume of poetry. Have a glass of wine at the window looking back over the river to the south city you just walked through. This is where the walk ends.
The Winding Stair takes its name from a W. B. Yeats collection. The staircase is real.
Keep Walking
Where to eat when the walk is done, where to sleep in the same neighbourhoods, and how to spend the rest of the trip on foot.
Now that you have the answer
Where to sleep so the walk starts at the door
Every route on this page begins in the Georgian core. These three put you inside it, which is the difference between walking Dublin and commuting into it.
The Westbury
Off Grafton Street
Two minutes from the start of the literary route and the first place we book for a first Dublin trip.
The Shelbourne
St Stephen's Green
The Green is on the doorstep, so the southside walk begins the moment you step outside.
The Dylan
Ballsbridge, quieter
Fifteen minutes out on foot along the canal. The right choice if you want the evenings calm.
Which Dublin neighbourhood suits you
Rates are checked on the hotel's own booking page. If you book through these links we may earn a commission, at no cost to you. It never changes which properties we recommend.
Common questions