Frederick Morley

Growing up on the Mill Road in the suburb of Corbally in Limerick, I was always intrigued by what I considered to be the remains of an entrance to an ancient Greek temple leading down into the river. A forgotten gathering place bereft of any purpose. Having moved to Dublin I discovered other open-air baths in the sea no longer in use. I learned of their popularity up until the 1960s. With current proposals for Clontarf, Warrenpoint and Dún Laoghaire Baths, are we ready to take the plunge or are they destined to remain seashore antiquities? Taking the Waters While swimming in the sea has always exercised atavistic appeal for humans (and dogs), it was during the eighteenth century that sea bathing became particularly popular and  fashionable. Sea bathing was seen as beneficial to  health, in much the same way as taking the waters was at spas in Lisdoonvarna and Mallow. The earliest designated bathing spots were recorded on Rocque’s 1756 map, for men and women, at Salthill near Monkstown as well as a bathhouse on Killiney Beach. The increased popularity of sea-bathing during the eighteenth century saw many towns in Ireland and Britain develop as resort towns frequented by the upper classes during the summer months. While the south coast of Dublin benefited from an impressive sandy expanse, a disadvantage was the shallowness of the shoreline and the fact that at low tide, the water receded for a distance of as much as two miles. Certain locations along the coast, such as the Forty Foot at Sandycove, were prized for the fact that they were largely unaffected by the tides. The best-known sea-bathing places of today were established by the railway companies to encourage coastal businesses. The construction of the Dublin to Kingstown (Dún Laoghaire) line saw the closure of the baths at Booterstown and Blackrock, as the bathing huts there were now cut off from the sea by the railway, which ran along an embankment across the shallow bay. While the arrival of the railway did spell the end for some bathing spots, it opened up other parts of the coast for bathing. Man-made baths became increasingly popular during the nineteenth century with the earliest sea-bath or ‘lido’ (an Italian word for beach, bespeaking elegance and cosmopolitan excitement) erected in 1833 at Lymington in Hampshire, England. The bathing pools at Clontarf, Sandymount and Dún Laoghaire all followed the style of the Lymington baths. Significant for their maritime heritage and 20th century maritime recreation tradition.       Bathing in Blackrock As early as 1754 a proposal was put forward to build a bathing place at Blackrock. When the Dublin and Kingstown railway was opened in 1834 Blackrock was the principal village between the termini. The Blackrock Promenade and Pier Company Ltd decided to establish “a promenade Pier and suitable Bathing Place for the residents in the locality and for the use of the public at a point near Blackrock Railway Station”.  This followed public outcry that access to the sea had been cut off with the building of the Railway line. The baths were completed by 1839 and a special integrated train ticket also permitted entrance to them. In 1887 the baths were rebuilt in concrete with a large gentlemen’s bath and a smaller ladies’ bath to the designs of architect and engineer William Kaye-Parry. In 1928, the Urban District Council bought the Blackrock baths for £2,000 and readied them for the Tailteann Games, a Celtic Olympics. The baths, with a 50-metre, eight-lane pool, were well known for their swimming galas and water polo and could accommodate up to 1,000 spectators.  They boasted dramatic 10m and 3m springboards, as well as two smaller children’s pools. The decline in use of the baths started in the late 1950s when indoor heated swimming pools started to appear in hotels and local authority facilities. Dún Laoghaire Corporation closed the Blackrock Baths to the public in 1987. The Leinster branch of the Irish Water Polo Association made private use of the pools, diligently carrying out extensive cleaning and repair work to make the baths usable again after a year of exposure to the sea – but succumbing to the need to withdraw the 10m diving platform from use for safety reasons. At this point, the estimated running losses for a summer season were £10-30k, depending on admission fees. By 1992, due to lack of maintenance, parts of the baths were dismantled. In 1997 they were sold by Pembroke estates holdings to developers Treasury Holdings who failed to get planning permission for a shopping mall encompassing the baths site and DART station in 2001. An earlier (and greedier) redevelopment proposal  which came from a council ‘ideas’ competition in 1999 comprised 54 apartments and a restaurant with retail and leisure facilities. In 2013, the baths were demolished due to safety concerns following a routine inspection by Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council. It was found that the diving platform had been significantly corroded and detached from the pool base. However, the bay in Blackrock is still used for swimming and board sailing.       Sandymount Swim Another massive seawater baths was built at Sandymount, designed by Frederick Morley, and erected as the Merrion Pier, Promenade and Baths in 1863. The baths did not operate all year round but  were usually open from late May until September. Serviced by both tram and rail it became very popular. 33,000 bathers used the facility at its height over the summer of 1890, splashing around in fresh seawater baths and reveling in ancillary pleasures such as music and refreshments. However, frequent ablution was not within the grasp of the unwashed poor. The Irish builder in 1863 noted that the  cost of admittance was well beyond what a labourer could afford, particularly if accompanied by his wife and children. It noted that these bathers ‘were compelled to shelter themselves in a [communal] bathing box close by with the scum of society…and were supplied with ragged garments called “bathing dresses” at