Glin Castle is let on an exclusive, catered basis for small weddings, house parties, executive dinners and day conferences, with dinner for up to 65 guests in the Entrance Hall and more than 15 en-suite bedrooms. The house stands on the south bank of the Shannon Estuary at Glin, in west County Limerick, Ireland, and was for centuries the seat of the FitzGerald Knights of Glin.
Seminars and company events
The castle offers companies executive lunches and dinners, product launches, team-building days and day conferences, with packages tailored on request. A board or leadership team can take the whole house, meet in the reception rooms and stay overnight in the bedrooms. The reservation office works Monday to Friday, 9 AM to 5 PM, and arranges menus and logistics at the enquiry stage. Golf groups and group tours with lunch are also hosted, and the house is available as a film location.
Weddings and receptions
Glin Castle offers an Intimate Castle Weddings package for couples who want the house to themselves. Guests can gather for drinks in the Drawing Room, dine in the Entrance Hall or the Dining Room, and dance on the hall's wooden floor, where traditional Irish dancing is often staged. Photographs can use the gardens and the views over the estuary.
Rooms and capacities
The Entrance Hall, with its screen of Corinthian columns and neo-classical plaster ceiling, seats up to 65 for dinner when tables are set out. The Dining Room, with claret walls and portraits of former Knights, seats 32 to 35 depending on the page of the site. The Drawing Room has six tall windows over the estuary, a Bossi marble chimney piece and an open fire, and serves for drinks before dinner and coffee after. The Library has a snooker table and a hidden door to the flying staircase. A Sitting Room with games and a television gives guests somewhere to unwind.
Accommodation
The castle has more than 15 en-suite bedrooms, each looking over the estuary or the gardens. Named rooms include Sundial View, the Green Bedroom, the Yellow Bedroom with its crown bed and the Castle Room.
Catering
Meals are cooked by chef Eoin Ruane and his team in a professional catering kitchen that serves up to about 60 people. Vegetables, herbs and fruit come from the castle's organic walled garden and wild garlic from its woods, alongside seafood from Carrigaholt, Kerry lamb, Limerick beef and cheese from a local producer. A second family kitchen with an Aga range hosts informal meals and cookery demonstrations such as traditional Irish baking.
History and setting
The FitzGeralds held land here for about seven centuries. Colonel John FitzGerald began the present house, probably in the 1780s, but money ran short and the top floor was never finished. In the 1820s John Fraunceis FitzGerald, the 24th Knight, added Gothic lodges and battlements, which gave the house its castle look. The gardens and woods frame views across the Shannon toward County Clare.
Getting there
Glin lies on the coast road along the estuary, close to the Ballybunion links courses and on the Wild Atlantic Way. Shannon Airport is the nearest international airport, about an hour and a quarter by road.
