Draggin' on into 21st century with 2,000 jobs now linked to Cork city's dragon-topped Penrose House

200th anniversary marked of born-again building on reclaimed marshy city ground with portico-topping statue of St George slaying the dragon

PROPERTY cycles? Market ebb and flow?

Try 150,000 high tides, and another 150,000 low ebbs for size,  over a full two centuries in the case of a quayside building like Cork’s Penrose House – now at the top of its game and a work anchor point for close on 2,000 jobs.

Penrose House marked its 200th anniversary this month, with the occasion marked by a visit and plaque unveiling in the restored centrepiece building by Lord Mayor of Cork, Kieran McCarthy. 

Notably, the current Lord Mayor Cllr McCarthy is the author of 30 books of Cork historical and River Lee valley interest, so the plaque unveiling in the George Pain-designed building right up his own back yard or dock.

Savills directors Isobel O'Regan, Karen Nolan, Peter O'Meara, and Catherine McAuliffe with Lord Mayor of Cork, Cllr Kieran McCarthy, who visited Penrose House on Cork’s historic quays to mark the 200th anniversary of its completion. Picture Chani Anderson

Now a physical anchor to the award-winning Penrose Dock 21st century offices-driven development by Kent rail station and Horgans Quay and 100% occupied, the limestone facade building was finished in 1824 on Penrose Quay, a riverfront location of the maritime transportation company, St. George Steam Packet Company, with a recently restored statute of St George slaying a dragon back on high on a plinth, complete with new spear.

A model of the Sirius, the first steamship to cross the Atlantic.  Denis Minihane.

The building’s own fortunes waxed and waned like the tides: it was built on marshy, reclaimed land created in the early 1800s by Cooper Penrose, was extremely active in the 19th and 20th centuries and later dropped off as port, ferry and wharf activity pivoted downstream.

Its reach spanned oceans too, as the St George Steam Packet Company’s most famous vessel, the Sirius, departed from Penrose Quay on an April day in 1838 for the very first transatlantic crossing by a steam-powered vessel, an 18 day voyage to New York.

A decorative detail inside Penrose House

Today, US and other international companies are among Penrose House/Penrose Dock’s occupier list in the  completed development by JCD Group. The adjacent two-office block development, picking up its vertical column references as a nod to Penrose House's Ionic columns,  was designed by Cork-based Wilson Architecture, and in 2022 won the International Architecture Award.

Among the most recent arrivals are medical research company aNuMe and estate agency Savills, who relocated from No 11 South Mall (just relet to an energy-related company, currently doing an office fit out there.)

Working at height. Workers on a platform working on the roof of Penrose House, Penrose Quay, in 2021.

As part of conservation moves at Penrose House, the 200-year old building has been brought to an impressive A3 BER grade, with the granular detail extending to the dragon-slaying St George statue up top.

Lord Mayor Cllr. Kieran McCarthy paid tribute to JCD Group for their commitment to the building and its history as part of their modern development and said “it’s an example of how the old and the new can be merged together to bring an interesting and unique element into the core of the new Cork Docklands. It will keep Penrose House at the heart of the city’s ongoing evolution.”

JCD Group CEO John Cleary commented that “the restoration of Penrose House is a project we are very proud of and the building forms an important part of the Penrose Dock scheme where almost 2,000 people are now employed.”