Henrietta Street (first session using the Sony NEX-7)

Henrietta Street (first session using the Sony NEX-7), originally uploaded by infomatique.

This was my first opportunity to try out the new Sony NEX-7 which will be generally available next month. For this session I used the SEL16F28 16mm f/2.8 Wide-Angle pancake lens and I have never liked it. I have ordered the SEL30M35 30mm f/3.5 Macro Lens and the SEL50F18 but they have not yet arrived.

And now a word about the location:

Henrietta Street is the earliest Georgian Street in Dublin – it is the model from which Dublin’s Georgian identity is derived. Construction on the street started in the mid 1720's, on land bought by the Gardiner family in 1721. Construction was still taking place in the 1750s.[4] Gardiner had a mansion, designed by Richard Cassels, built for his own use around 1730.

Henrietta Street was lined on both sides by massive Georgian houses built on a palatial scale. At the top end of the street, a new James Gandon building, the King's Inns, was erected between 1795 and 1816. In this building, barristers were trained and earned their academic qualifications. Such was the prestige of the street that many of the most senior figures in Irish 'establishment' society, peers of the realm, judges, barristers, bishops bought houses here. Under the anti-Catholic Penal Laws, Roman Catholics, though the overwhelming majority in Ireland, were harshly discriminated against, barred from holding property rights or from voting in parliamentary elections until 1793. Thus the houses of Georgian Dublin, particularly in the early phase before Catholic Emancipation was granted in 1829, were almost invariably owned by a small Church of Ireland Anglican elite, with Catholics only gaining admittance to the houses as skivvies and servants.

The street fell into disrepair during the 19th and 20th centuries, with the houses being used as tenements, but has been the subject of restoration efforts in recent years.

There are currently 13 houses on the street. The street is a cul-de-sac, with the Law Library of King's Inns facing onto its western end.