Barfly: O'Neill's
36-37 Pearse St, Dublin 2, Tel. 01 6714074
Strolling down's Dublin's perennially gritty Pearse Street, 'old world charm' is not necessarily the first phrase that leaps to mind.
Yet that's exactly what you get at O'Neill's -- a beautifully preserved Victorian bar with spit and sawdust floors straight out of a Ronnie Drew biopic and enough discreet booths and dark corners to keep even the most privacy conscious beer-hound happy.
Located close to Trinity's Science Gallery, O'Neill's also displays an obsession with the natural world: the exterior is draped in so many hanging baskets and window boxes, you half expect to come across Diarmuid Gavin stuck in the middle of it all, wielding a pitchfork. Inside, there's a proper Christmas Carol atmosphere: faded sepia prints on the walls, floorboards that creak atmospherically underfoot and fixtures that could have been brought straight from the set of Antique Roadshow (it's no surprise to learn O'Neill's is named-checked in Ulysses).
There's often a trade-off between ambiance and creature comforts in Dublin pub land -- inevitably the most atmospheric boozers are also the pokiest. Happily, that's not the case here: O'Neill's is a veritable warren and even on a heaving weekend night, you can expect to nab a seat.
- Ed Power
Irish Independent
