Six metres high and six and a half metres wide, it is a structure of considerable presence for something so thoroughly forgotten, occupying the lip of a limestone quarry as though it simply never left.

Lime kilns were once a fixture of the Irish agricultural and industrial landscape, used to burn quarried limestone at high temperatures to produce quicklime, which could then be spread on acidic soils to improve fertility or used in the making of mortar. This example at Derryvillane has the characteristic features of a well-built kiln: a large arched recess on the northeast-facing front elevation, measuring roughly two and a half metres high and wide and nearly as deep, with a second lower arch set inside it. Corbelled stones, that is, stones projecting inward from the wall in a stepped arrangement to help distribute structural load, survive at the rear. A rectangular opening at the base, known as the draw hole, is where the burnt lime would have been raked out once firing was complete. The positioning within a working quarry makes practical sense; the raw material was immediately to hand, and the cliff edge above the Funshion would have provided both a natural draught and a convenient means of moving material.

The front elevation faces northeast and remains the most legible part of the structure, though overgrown. The rear is largely obscured by vegetation, which makes a full appreciation of the kiln's depth and construction difficult without some clearance.