08/06/2025
So proud to have been a part of this diversity.
If West Cork is a universe unto itself, Ballydehob is a universe within that universe. It's home to 300 souls, several nationalities, one Michelin star, a 12-arch bridge, a three-arch bridge, the biggest small jazz festival in the world, an ATM you really should get to before 10pm, and a rabbit hole behind every door.
“It’s not just a drive-through place,” local artist Marie Cullen says. “There have always been people from different parts of the world coming here.”
We chat about the tradition of artists, makers, hippies and hipsters coming since the late 1950s (Ballydehob’s ‘Flower House’ was a famous hub, ‘Bohemian Ballydehob’ is celebrated in seasonal exhibitions at an art museum in the old bank, and actors like Saoirse Ronan, Paul Mescal and Robert Sheehan have homes nearby).
Rural Ireland has its lights and darknesses, and I’m sure Ballydehob has them too. But for decades this place has felt like a magnet for diversity, thrummed with a chemistry typified by cafés like Budd’s, the trad and art and craic in Rosie’s pub, or Levis Corner House — a pink, p***y little pub that hosts food truck pop-ups (Caitlin Ruth, Spice Genie and Doxy & Danny are cooking up this summer), small gigs by some of the biggest names in Irish music and a stonking jazz festival, while also feeling like it hasn’t changed so much as a speck of dust in its 111 years.
Read more on the Irish Independent website.
