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HISTORY OF NUMBER 10, DUBLIN
by Elenor Flegg (Irish Art's Review)
In the time that has passed since the construction of Number 10, Lower Ormond Quay, only the Liffey remains unaltered.
In a landscape bristling with instability and change, the great body of water passes slowly outside the windows much as it has done for 250 years. In fact Ormond Quay was originally planned to back onto the water, although in 1674 James Butler, the 1st Duke of Ormonde (1610-1688), after whom it is named, intervened and persuaded the developer to build facing the river, leaving the street open to the water as a quay.
Number 10, a four storey over basement semi-detached house, was not built until 1745 when Robert Rochfort, later 1st Earl of Belvedere, commissioned the design from the German architect Richard Cassels (1690-1751), also known as Richard Castle. Cassels settled in Ireland around 1728, and was responsible for some of the largest houses in Ireland including Russborough (1742-1755), County Wicklow, and Carton (1739-1745), County Kildare.
Once built, Number 10 was immediately let, according to the Georgian custom of leasing a house as a shell, to the banker David La Touche.
La Touche was of French Hugeunot origin. His father, David Digues La Touche des Rompieres, had fled to Holland in search of religious freedom and came to Ireland to fight in the Battle of the Boyne (1690) in the defence force of William of Orange.
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