When I was a child of about 8 years old, a photo album someone had given me as a gift developed a tear on its cover.

To my amazement, when I looked closer I saw that, underneath the cover image, there was a selection of newspaper pages with Japanese print. I was fascinated by this discovery and felt I must be the only child in Tipperary with a real Japanese newspaper in my possession.

Why this story in the introduction to my blog about Greenville, our home in Tipperary, Ireland’s midlands?

Maybe because I have always remembered my intense curiosity and excitement that day, in finding something that was not common, something from another culture and place, something different, that was still very beautiful to my eyes.

My life, the career route I chose in studying Anthropology, and everything I have done to date – working with local tourist and community development projects; event management; designing and running my cafe – boutique ‘The Business’; bringing Greenville back to life as our home; writing this blog about local arts and food –  have all been about seeking out or doing something a little bit different.

I think of Greenville as a place apart, a space that is colorful and interesting and not ‘typically’ Irish.

Twists and Turns

Looking back, I never intended to base myself in rural Ireland, or indeed here at Killough. When I returned to Tipperary from Maynooth to write up my doctoral thesis in Cultural Anthropology, it was intended to be for a short while. But it was during that time that I visited my maternal grandparents’ home in Killough, and had a burning desire to bring it back to life.  Life takes its twists and turns and, well here I am, here we are.

Had I made different choices, I expect I would have settled in Paris, a city I loved when there as a young adult working as an au pair and studying.

Blog Content

In the posts that follow, I will go out and about in Tipperary and sometimes further afield, to find out more about what people working in Arts and Crafts are doing. I will also write blogs from ‘Denise’s kitchen’ about the food I make for family and friends.

I hope you enjoy it.

Welcome to Greenville, welcome to my world in Tipperary – my style.

Denise

Photo Credits

Several images used in the initial posts on this blog were taken either by Tom Doherty or Ramona Farrelly.  A huge thanks to them both for allowing me to reproduce their work.