Ormston House and Sharon Slater are delighted to win the National Heritage Week Award for Limerick with Women of Limerick. This mobile phone app remembers and celebrates women from Limerick’s history. Thirty women have been mapped across the city at important locations from their stories – from Órlaith íngen Cennétig who was Queen of Ireland in 941, to Dolores O’Riordan who earned international stardom with The Cranberries in the 1990s.

For National Heritage Week, Sharon created a new layer on the map, locating public artworks by women artists. From modest interventions to large-scale commissions, there are ten permanent artworks to visit, at prominent sites and hiding in plain sight. You can plan walking routes through the city, or engage with Limerick’s cultural heritage at your fingertips, wherever you are in the world.

Women of Limerick is available to download for free onto Android and Apple devices.

Sharon Slater was named National Heritage Hero in 2017 by the Heritage Council of Ireland. She is currently Historian-in-Residence at Ormston House and is advising on a range of artistic commissions and creative projects. For over twenty years, Sharon has been researching the history of life in Limerick, and she holds an MA in Local History from the University of Limerick. She is the author of multiple publications, most recently The A-Z of Curious County Limerick (2021).

Our thanks to Alan Dormer, Charlotte Lee, Cllr. Elisa O’Donovan, Deirdre Power, and Uvis Zviedris. Women of Limerick is developed as part of the Feminist Supermarket (2020–) at Ormston House curated by Niamh Brown and Mary Conlon. Our thanks to the Arts Council of Ireland, Creative Ireland, the Community Initiative Scheme, and Limerick Culture & Arts Office for the funding support.

Image: Charlotte Lee’s digital drawing of the Dun Emer Press logo designed by Elinor Darwin in 1904.