An eye-catching timely window display in Topshop's St Stephen's Green store hints at the eclectic range of entertainments offered by this year's Dublin Fringe Festival, which starts next Saturday.
It's not that long since the Fringe was a formal sideshow to the main event that was the Dublin Theatre Festival, but every year of independence gives the Fringe even more scope to express its individuality.
This year's Fringe takes over the Iveagh Gardens off Harcourt Street, renaming it the Secret Garden for the duration, while in the process making it less secret than ever. The iconic Spiegeltent, for the past few years the beating heart of the festival in Custom House Quay, has been moved there, and it has some new company in the shape of the Bosco Theatre.
The Spiegeltent will also host the returning La Clique, which set a lot more than just pulses racing last year. Get tickets quick, it's a must-see.
The Fringe, of course, can't be restricted to the Secret Garden, and there are more than 100 acts presenting dance, music, visual art and yep, even some theatre, spread across the city's streets and venues.
Among the more offbeat offerings are Bastien and Bastienne, which marks the marriage of two modes of artistic expression that some cynics thought could never peacefully co-exist - opera and flash-mobs - while Transports Exceptionnellessees a "tender love duet between a dancer and a mechanical digger accompanied by the dramatic voice of Maria Callas", because who hasn't seen a JCB and wondered if they'd be any good on the dancefloor?
Check out the sprawling programme and buy tickets at www.fringefest.com, call 1850-FRINGE or at the box office in Filmbase, Curved Street, Temple Bar.
Davin O'Dwyer