Wife, mother, and maker of fine furniture

Ellie O’Byrne met a woman who, perhaps surprisingly, was turning out craft furniture in the Cork of the 1950s and 1960s

GOOGLE “Irish women furniture makers,” and only one name crops up repeatedly: that of Eileen Gray.

Wexford-born Gray, the modernist architect and designer, became known as Ireland’s most influential furniture designer; in 2009, one of her designs, a 1919 dragon armchair, broke all records when it sold at auction in Christie’s for €22m.