Monaghan Cathedral (Monaghan (Muineachán))

 cathedral, Gothic revival (architecture), listed building / architectural heritage, Roman Catholic church, 1892_construction

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Saint Macartan's Cathedral is one of the great buildings of the Irish Gothic Revival. Designed by J.J. McCarthy in 1861 and finished by William Hague in 1892.
Comprises gable-fronted five-bay nave with side aisles, half-octagonal-plan baptistery attached to north two bays along, two-bay transepts, clerestorey to nave and transepts, four-stage tower with elaborate spired top to re-entrant corner of nave and south transept, two-bay chancel with half-octagonal-plan apse, double-pile side chapels to re-entrant corner of nave and chancel, and five-bay two-storey chapter house to east end of north side of nave, with two-bay side elevations. Pitched slate roofs, hip-ended to apse and baptistery, with wrought-iron cross finials, clay tile ridge, broken coursed rubble limestone parapet with moulded stone copings. Sculpted stone crosses to apexes of all gables. Square-profile cast-iron rainwater goods with decorative hoppers. Chapter house has similar detailing, and ashlar chimneystacks with moulded string courses and copings, and half-octagonal-plan ends. Tower spire of octagonal plan with crocketed top with wind vane, string courses, two rows of lucarnes, upper having double-light trefoil-headed window openings with gabled hoods to cardinal points, decorative scalloped sandstone band to base of upper lucarnes and across spires of lower lucarnes, lower row of lucarnes having spired openwork canopies to all facets with cross finials and false lucarnes over trefoil-headed open sides borne on colonettes with capitals and bases, lucarnes to cardinal points having timber louvres. Snecked dressed ashlar limestone walls with high stepped plinth, continuous sloped sill course, moulded cornice to base of parapet.