Clonygowan House, Clonygowan, Co. Offaly

This is a dovecote, a purpose-built structure for keeping pigeons, and its survival long after the demolition of the main house makes it an odd sort of monument, a piece of estate infrastructure that has outlasted the estate.

Built around 1830, the dovecote at Clonygowan was never simply functional. Raised on piers with arches running between them, and topped with a hipped slate roof, it was designed to be seen as much as used. Pigeons kept in such structures provided a steady supply of meat and eggs for the household, but the elevated, ornamental treatment here, roughcast rendered walls finished with a red brick eaves course, a round-headed opening on the south-east face dressed in red brick, and matching blind arches on the other sides, suggests the building was doing double duty. Landed estates of this period often used dovecotes, follies, and similar structures as eye-catchers, features placed within sight of the main house to draw the eye and give the parkland a sense of composed, deliberate design. Clonygowan's dovecote seems to have served exactly that purpose, feeding the household while also giving visitors something to look at as they made their way up to a house that no longer exists.