From the archives

Ireland’s Historic Birr Castle Receives a Chic Makeover

A globe-trotting aristocrat and his young family leave their beloved Beijing to return to the family estate

Photography bySimon Watson

January 3, 2017

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The circa-1810 Gothic Saloon at Birr Castle, the ancestral home of the Parsons family in Ireland's County Offaly, is also known as the Music Room, thanks to the fine acoustics that make it ideal for concerts. The flocked wallpaper dates from the 19th century, as do the curtains; the leather screen is 18th-century Dutch, and the large set of circa-1730 painted chairs may be Venetian or Maltese.
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Patrick Parsons, Lord Oxmantown, who recently moved back to the castle after 20 years in China, strolls in the garden with his wife, Anna (wearing an evening dress of her own design), and their children, William and Olivia.
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Birr Castle was given a Gothic Revival makeover in the early 19th century.
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Along with family portraits, the main dining room features a 19th-century table surrounded by William and Mary–style chairs; the chandelier is thought to have been purchased at Paris’s 1855 Exposition Universelle.

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A Louis XV–style tall case clock, circa 1870, stands against a wall in the Yellow Drawing Room; Patrick’s grandmother Anne Rosse, mother-in-law of England’s Princess Margaret, hung the room with yellow damask in the 1950s.
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An 18th-century Venetian chandelier complements the Yellow Drawing Room’s 1930s damask sofas and chairs. The marble mantel is also 18th century, as are the rococo mirrors and the gilt-wood demilune tables.
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The castle’s 13th-century entrance hall was remodeled in the 1830s after a fire; the 17th-century Brussels tapestries came into the family in 1935.

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Mary Rosse, wife of the third earl, designed the Keep Gate, a mid-19th-century building marking the transition from the park to the castle grounds.
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Olivia and William romp in a boxwood parterre.
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The property’s 1820 suspension bridge, which crosses the River Camcor, is the earliest such structure in Ireland.

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The library’s marble mantel hosts a circa-1840 French clock; the Gothic Revival brass-bound bucket was designed to hold turf, a traditional Irish fireplace fuel. At far left is an 18th-century chinoiserie leather screen that is English or Dutch in origin.
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Birr’s main staircase has been called the fairest in Ireland.
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Anne Rosse decorated the Conroy Room in the 1930s, using French wallpaper and grosgrain curtains with stenciled borders; the mantel is 19th century.

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A bedroom is outfitted with a Gothic Revival furniture suite, reportedly made by Birr’s carpenters; artist Carl Thoms painted the screen with scenes of the estate, Anne Rosse stitched the chair and stool with her monogram, and the coverlet was purchased in Pakistan.