The efforts to save Ireland's traditional farm buildings

Rural houses, farm buildings and farmyard features connect us to the past

A striking number of old stone farm buildings have survived in Ireland and there is now an increasing focus on their restoration. Picture: Getty Images

The poet Patrick Kavanagh, who understood Irish rural people, their lifestyle and landscapes more than most, was always attuned to the fact that great events can happen in the simplest places.

One of those places was his own family farmhouse at Inniskeen in Monaghan, a detached two-storey house with a pitched slate roof and two flat-roofed porches.