Museum in a Garden welcomes everyone.
It has areas for quiet reflection, for community activity, for games and for eating and drinking. It is fully accessible for the physically disabled and has a sensory garden with plants for touching and smelling.
It is a work in progress, opened officially on 24 June 2021 by Eanna Ní Lamhna and is a result of some generous donations and our 2020 Fund-a-Cobble fundraiser.
The Sculptures
Using the technologies of 3D scanning and 3D printing, the artefacts “hidden” within the museum, are made large and placed outside the walls of the museum for play and enjoyment.
Our first is Olmec Man. The Olmec were one of the earliest civilisations in Mesoamerica. modern-day Mexico. Pre-dating the Aztecs and the Maya, the Olmec were great craftspeople and artists who appear to have had elaborate burial rites. Olmec Man is similar to sculptures found in a burial at the Olmec city La Venta, which flourished between c. 900 – 400 BC.
This sculpture is made of Tricoya, an Irish durable and sustainable wood-based product from a 3D scan that was enlarged and then machined using computer numerical control (CNC).
The creation of Olmec man was a collaboration between Arup, Transition Year students of Ardscoil Mhuire and Coláiste Chiaráin. MONARÚ aided by a grant from the ESB
Sweeney’s Throne, by Tom Fitzgerald who was born in County Limerick in 1939. The work evokes Sweeney, a mythical king who was cursed and transformed into a bird. It consists of a stainless steel wing which curves down to a throne of limestone. At the foot of the throne is the impression of footprints. The work is described as a trace left behind, after Sweeney’s wanderings through Ireland. Tom Fitzgerald is an artist living in County Limerick. He was Head of Sculpture in Limerick School of Art & Design
Poised Portal by Eileen McDonagh (1987). Constructed from limestone. Eileen was born in Co.Sligo in 1956 and has worked as a sculptor since the early 1980s. Her work has featured in many exhibitions, both in Ireland and abroad, including shows in Portugal, Scotland, India and Japan. Many of MacDonagh’s sculptures examines a fascination with geometry. She has long been inspired by the purity and ubiquity of geometric principles and the way in which geometric rules govern the universe.
We also need support to produce more of our 3D Museum Replicas, or to encourage sculptors to create new pieces for the remaining six plinths in the garden. If you can donate €250 or more we can claim the 31% tax relief, making your donation worth nearly a third more. As well as more sculpture we want to improve lighting and disabled access and use of the garden.
The garden will feature super-sized sculptures replicating artefacts from the museum. First to be installed is Olmec Man, a Mexican artefact that was digitised by TY students and made into a two-metre outdoor replica using 3D printing technologies with help from ESB, Arup, the Limerick School of Art & Design (LSAD) and Monaru.ie. Picture: Alan Place
Picture: Alan Place
Picture: Alan Place
Picture: Alan Place
The Garden
Museum in a Garden was designed by Nicola Haines of Tierney Haines Architects, who won the public competition. The design draws on the maritime connections of the building and museum collection by creating ‘tide lines’ of grass and planting that ebb and flow around the garden, creating alcoves of shelter for exhibition space, seating and play. Exhibition alcoves are planted to give a flavour of the geographical origin of the escaped, enlarged museum objects.
The local community and volunteers with mental health issues together with professionals are maintaining the garden to provide a communal vibrant green space for everyone. There is a Sean Moran Community Garden that includes vegetable boxes and a large area of sensory plants.
Picture: Alan Place
Join us and help in our Museum in a Garden. Picture:Alan Place
Picture: Alan Place
Games in the Garden
There is a permanent garden chess board and many other garden games such as quoits, boules, croquet can be borrowed. Events such as music, theatre, chess and boules tournaments, painting, sand sculpture are encouraged. See our What’s On.
24.06.21.
The Hunt Museum, which exhibits one of Irelands greatest private collections of Art and Antiquities, has created an exciting new public space for Limerick. Museum in a Garden takes the Hunt Museum outside its walls to create a public urban garden in the heart of Limerick. The concept behind the garden is to break down barriers to culture and art and encourage greater engagement with the community.
Enjoying a game of rings at the opening of the Museum in a Garden, Hunt Museum Limerick was, Ellie McGlynn, 10, North Circular Road Limerick. Picture Alan Place.
Last year, The Hunt removed the railings around its green space to create the Museum in a Garden. Conceived as an extension to the museum, the garden will feature seven super-sized sculptures replicating artefacts from the museum. First to be installed is Olmec Man, a Mexican artefact that was digitised by TY students and made into a two-metre outdoor replica using 3D printing technologies with help from ESB, Arup, the Limerick School of Art & Design (LSAD) and Monaru.ie. Picture: Alan Place
24.06.21.
The Hunt Museum, which exhibits one of Ireland’s greatest private collections of Art and Antiquities, has created an exciting new public space for Limerick. Museum in a Garden takes the Hunt Museum outside its walls to create a public urban garden in the heart of Limerick. The concept behind the garden is to break down barriers to culture and art and encourage greater engagement with the community.
Enjoying a game of Croquet at the opening of the Museum in a Garden, Hunt Museum Limerick was Tom O'Sullivan, 10, Mungret Co. Limerick. Picture Alan Place.
Last year, The Hunt removed the railings around its green space to create the Museum in a Garden. Conceived as an extension to the museum, the garden will feature seven super-sized sculptures replicating artefacts from the museum. First to be installed is Olmec Man, a Mexican artefact that was digitised by TY students and made into a two-metre outdoor replica using 3D printing technologies with help from ESB, Arup, the Limerick School of Art & Design (LSAD) and Monaru.ie. Picture: Alan Place
24.06.21.
The Hunt Museum, which exhibits one of Ireland’s greatest private collections of Art and Antiquities, has created an exciting new public space for Limerick. Museum in a Garden takes the Hunt Museum outside its walls to create a public urban garden in the heart of Limerick. The concept behind the garden is to break down barriers to culture and art and encourage greater engagement with the community.
Enjoying a game of Chess at the opening of the Museum in a Garden, Hunt Museum Limerick were, Julie, 12 and Tom, 10 O'Sullivan, Mungret Co. Limerick. Picture Alan Place.
Last year, The Hunt removed the railings around its green space to create the Museum in a Garden. Conceived as an extension to the museum, the garden will feature seven super-sized sculptures replicating artefacts from the museum. First to be installed is Olmec Man, a Mexican artefact that was digitised by TY students and made into a two-metre outdoor replica using 3D printing technologies with help from ESB, Arup, the Limerick School of Art & Design (LSAD) and Monaru.ie. Picture: Alan Place
Picture: Alan Place
Be part of the garden
If you would like to remember a friend or loved one in the garden we continue to sell the engraved and inscribed cobble stones and to raise funds for the new Greenhouse. See Fund-A-Cobble – Take 2.
We are also always on the look out for volunteers for planting, for weeding and general maintenance. If you are interested please contact info@huntmuseum.com
Or, visit Help in your garden.
Some of the cobbles placed in the garden.
Sponsor a bench to remember loved ones.
Sponsor a bench to remember loved ones.
Buy an engraved cobble and dedicate it to a loved one.
History
In 2016 the Garden at the back of The Hunt Museum was opened to the public but the railings remained in place. In the Summer of 2020 with help from UMR, a local recycling company, the railings were removed. At the time the Garden Design Competition was launched the OPW carried out a Tree Survey. This showed the Pink Chestnut to be badly diseased and a danger to the public. Two further surveys confirmed this result and led to removal of tree, deliberately leaving its lower trunk and roots in the ground so not to disturb the roots of the other large trees and to keep the ground stable. A public consultation resulted in the desire to turn the remaining tree stump into a sculpture for the Garden.
The idea of making a museum in a garden came from the wish to break down the perceived barrier of entry into the building. The objects are coming to the public.
Competition winner
Three finalists and a public consultation later, the judges of the Hunt Museum Garden Design Competition decided on Nicola Haines’s amazing community influenced garden for the Hunt Museum.
Click HERE to see more about it.
Public Tree Consultation
A survey to check the condition of the trees and undertake any necessary action was carried out by an independent contractor of the OPW on 29 September 2020.
Click HERE to see the full results of this survey.
