Survey Data
Reg No
40907430
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Cultural, Historical, Social
Original Use
House
Date
1850 - 1890
Coordinates
181727, 394917
Date Recorded
18/10/2016
Date Updated
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Description
Detached five-bay vernacular house, built c.1870, with half-dormer storey to east end, also having external steps to gable of latter, and two-bay outshot to rear. Now disused. Pitched slate roof with three rendered chimneystacks with projecting brick cappings and fire-clay flues, and remains of cast-iron rainwater goods. Ruled-and-lined smooth-rendered walls on projecting plinth with decorative block-and-start quoins to each end of front facade. Square-headed doorway with painted reveals and glazec timber door. Square-headed window openings with painted reveals and two-over-two pane horned timber sliding sashes with exposed sash boxes. Set within own grounds, surrounded by trees.
Appraisal
The Laurels is a very typical four-room vernacular house, found throughout Donegal and elsewhere in Ireland. Its main significance is as the setting for and the home of the five sisters who provided the inspiration for the Mundy sisters in the play 'Dancing at Lughnasa' (1990) by the noted playwright and founder of the Field Day Theatre Company, Brian Friel (1929-2015). It was the home of Brian Friel's grandfather, Barney McLoone, who worked at the nearby railway station, and his wife Sarah and ten children, of whom five were daughters – the Mundy sisters. Mundy is a local derivation of the family name McLoone.