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heritage · Thursday 27 August 2026 · 18:30 
En Vogue: Fashionable Irish Women from the 15th-17th Century
At Edenderry Library · Edenderry, Co. Offaly
At Edenderry Library · Edenderry, Co. Offaly
A free Heritage Week talk that takes you back to the wardrobes of Elizabethan Ireland - and asks what those clothes tell us about the women who wore them. Fashion Historian Laura Fitzachery presents “En Vogue: Fashionable Irish Women from the 15th-17th Century” at Edenderry Library on the evening of 27 August 2026. It is the kind of event that suits anyone curious about Irish history, social life, or material culture - and it happens to be one of the more distinctive offerings in Offaly’s Heritage Week programme.
The talk runs alongside the “Unstitching the Shinrone Gown” exhibition, which is on at Edenderry Library from 16 to 29 August. The Shinrone Gown is one of the most remarkable surviving garments in Irish history - a dark woollen dress pulled from Cangort Bog near Shinrone, Co. Offaly in 1843. Dating to the late 16th or early 17th century, it now lives in the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin, and is considered one of the earliest intact Irish garments in existence. Its cut is distinctly Irish: an open front bodice with a small standing collar and heavily pleated skirt, closer in shape to illustrations of Irish noblewomen of the period than to anything fashionable in contemporary England.
The exhibition at Edenderry Library includes a painstakingly made replica of the gown, recreated by Shinrone Heritage Group with craftswomen Rosalind Fanning and Bernie Stapleton using period-appropriate materials and original measurements. A short documentary about the recreation process accompanies it.
Laura Fitzachery’s talk on the evening of 27 August puts the gown in its broader context - exploring how Irish women of the early modern period dressed, what fabrics and styles were available to them, and how their clothes differed from (and were judged against) English fashions of the same era. It is a public lecture rather than a formal academic event, and questions are welcome.
Edenderry is in north Co. Offaly, about 65km west of Dublin via the M4 and R402, or roughly 40 minutes from Tullamore. The town is served by Bus Eireann from Dublin and from Tullamore, and the library is in the centre of town, within easy walking distance of the main street. Parking is available on the streets around the town centre.
Edenderry sits close to the Grand Canal and the Bog of Allen - good walking territory if you are in the area for the day. Heritage Week typically brings a range of events across the county, so it is worth checking what else is on nearby. There is more to see in Edenderry and across Co. Offaly.
Heading to Edenderry Library in Edenderry? Offaly has plenty more to see. Read the Edenderry area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.