Arts festival: The organisers of the Dún Laoghaire Festival of World Cultures hope it will cap the town's transformation from a drug-infested, downbeat place to an upmarket, family-friendly destination, writes Kathryn Holmquist.
Business owners around the country know that every thriving town has to have a festival. Arts events bring in visitors with money to spend in restaurants and shops. Which is why business people in Dún Laoghaire have embraced their local government's ambitions to make Dún Laoghaire more than a place to pass through on the way to and from the ferry. They want the area to be regarded as a destination in its own right.
"The Dún Laoghaire Festival of World Cultures is part of the rejuvenation of Dún Laoghaire," says Mary Hickson, festival co-ordinator. "Dún Laoghaire is the main cultural port of Dublin. It was the first port created in Ireland and for many visitors, it's the first place they see." Dún Laoghaire residents (and I count myself as one for the past 18 years), may be surprised to hear their hamlet described as a "cultural port". For the past two decades, the drugs culture has threatened to overwhelm the town centre. The major shopping centre, built in the 1970s, is gloomy and blocks out the view of the sea so that the best view of Dún Laoghaire port is from the shopping centre's overcrowded car park. Gangs of youths drank cider and did drug deals in parks and on the seafront. Empty shop fronts and tatty signage have become common and at one point there were so many pound shops on Georges's Street that residents despaired of an upmarket business ever succeeding there again.
Recent efforts by Dún LaoghaireRathdown County Council to improve Dún Laoghaire by pedestrianising Upper Georges's Street and installing attractive lighting and street furniture have attracted grumbles from business owners and residents alike, who feel strangled by traffic jams caused by the constant digging up of the streets. At times it has been easier for residents to skirt the town and do their shopping in Blackrock and their dining out in Dalkey and Sandycove/Glasthule - which is ironic considering Dún Laoghaire is one of the wealthiest areas in the country.
But this summer has brought a new optimistic mood to the town. Attractive hard landscaping and sculpture adorn the seafront walk. On warm days, the Pavilion development is packed with people sitting outside eating bagels and drinking café latte. The Pavilion Theatre has steadily grown a reputation for fine performance and its art gallery attracts overflow crowds to openings. Three trendy new restaurants - Café Mao, Roly's @ the Pavilion and the 40 Foot - are often booked out at weekends and the nearby Brasserie Na Mara has become part of the renaissance. The new County Hall Concourse welcomes people inside. A 12-cinema IMC complex and Bloomfield's Shopping Centre have brought life back to the Upper Georges's Street end of town near York Road. The Dance Theatre of Ireland has added a bohemian cache to the complex. At the other end of town, the well-maintained People's Park with its Shakespeare in the Park, Garden Festival and tea-rooms has a buzzy family atmosphere. A discreet but effective Garda presence has cleaned up the streets.
The Festival of World Cultures, which runs from Friday, August 23rd until Sunday, August 25th in a cascade of bellydance, samba and salsa, will cap Dún Laoghaire's new reputation as an upmarket, upbeat, family-friendly place to spend a few hours. It's all due to the vision of Jody Ackland, festival director, who sent her proposal for a Festival of World Cultures to several county councils around the country three years ago.
Derek Brady, Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown county manager, snapped up Jody and her plans. Last summer, the festival ran on a pilot basis in the civic plaza at the Pavilion and was so successful that organisers were able to convince more local businesses to participate this year.
The idea, says Hickson, is to attract visitors up from the Pavilion to the centre of town. Bloomfield's Shopping Centre will host events, as will Dún Laoghaire Shopping Centre, and several pubs. The World Festival concept celebrates the new multi-cultural vibe in Dún Laoghaire, presenting the arrival of refugees in the town as an asset.
Hickson adds: "It's good for the morale of the area, so it's not just a bedroom community of Dublin and has an identity of its own."
The Dún Laoghaire Festival runs from August 23rd to 25th
