cMahon family.
The new Congregationalist chapel on the corner of Hartstonge Street and Catherine Place was a three-bay building and is believed to have been designed by Robert Fogerty. It is designed in the Victorian Elizabethan style, and – like the former Leamy School across the street – it is another essay in the exuberant Victorian style, offering an interesting and curious stylistic contrast to the surrounding Georgian architecture of Newtown Pery.
The building has bay windows on two sides, large gabled dormers, a pointed-arched door opening, encaustic tiles, a hipped roof finished with terracotta finials, a limestone chimneystack, and wrought-iron railings.
The Congregationalists did not stay here for long. By the 1901 Census, the building was listed as Lansdowne Soldiers’ Home. By the 1940s, the building was the Munster and Leinster Centre for Fianna Fáil, and the name can still be seen over the door.
The building had a number of other uses after that, and it was a scout hall until 1980, when it was renovated. Since 1982, it has been the offices of Arup Consulting Engineers.
Although the Congregationalists have long faded from the denominational array in Limerick, this building remains a reminder of the variety and diversity that make up the colourful mosaic of the city.
Updated 11 January 2018: to clarify the architectural remains on Bedford Row are from the former Wesleyan Methodist Chapel.