Suzanne Harrington: Being veggie was hard work in the '80s — Quay Co-Op was the place to be

I remember the first time going up the stairs of the Quay Co-Op, and seeing all these radical flyers on the walls. Gay rights. Women’s rights. I didn’t know Cork had any gays, or that women had any rights

Donal O’Gara, Virginia O’Gara, Arthur Leahy and Wayne Dunlea share tea around a quiet table at the Quay Co-Op restaurant on Sullivan’s Quay, Cork City, reflecting on its past as they prepare for My Goodness to reopen the space as a pop-up vegan restaurant for Christmas. Picture Chani Anderson.

As a Cork native long-term located elsewhere, a constant feature of trips back to Ireland over the decades has always been popping into the Quay Co-Op for a sit down in that high-ceiling space overlooking the river. A place to exhale.

And then I saw a headline that it was closing down. My heart sank. Was it about to be turned into luxury apartments? A steakhouse? A carpark?