placenamesCastlecomer
Caisleán an Chomair
Two surviving complexes record changes in institutional care and manufacturing beyond the coalfield.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- Caisleán an Chomair · Irish · main form · validated name
- Castlecomer · English · main form
Place & story
Workhouse buildings at Donaguile
The former union workhouse at Donaguile was built in 1853–54. The architectural inventory records two long three-storey blocks joined by a lower connecting range. It dates hospital conversion to 1901 and substantial rebuilding of the connecting range to around 1925. The surviving fabric therefore contains several phases: the later hospital was an adaptation of the workhouse complex, rather than an entirely new institution housed in a single unchanged building. [2]
Basket and pram manufacture on High Street
Creamery House on High Street began as a substantial eighteenth-century dwelling. The heritage inventory records its subsequent use as the Castlecomer Basket Factory and Pram Works between about 1900 and 1913. Its formal domestic design remained legible, including a columned entrance porch and an internal staircase with carved timber fittings. That combination of manufacturing use and retained house fabric adds another strand to the town’s industrial history. The record does not identify a secure original purpose for its polygonal outbuilding. [3]
Geographic information
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Castlecomer. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Castlecomer Union Workhouse and District Hospital, NIAH12301066 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Creamery House, Castlecomer Basket Factory and Pram Works, NIAH12301021 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2025-01-10. How this page was prepared.