Highlight Thomas Street, Student Accommodation

Project overview

IAC successfully carried out all pre-construction archaeological services for the 257-bed Student Accommodation Facility (8,625 m²) on the site of the landmark Frawley’s Department Store at Nos. 30 & 32-36 Thomas Street.

The constricted nature of the urban site, situated within the highly sensitive medieval core of Dublin, required expert detailed dynamic archaeological risk assessment, management and continuous consultation with the City Archaeologist, National Monuments Service and National Museum during the course of the Design and Build process.

IAC undertook an array of pre-planning risk assessment including desktop research, test trenching, building surveys, and monitoring of site investigations. This was followed by an extensive excavation within the basement footprint of the development, involving the investigation of up to 2m of archaeological deposits. This work identified elements of the northern precinct of the medieval abbey of St Thomas the Martyr (DU018-020051) including c. 124 burials.

To the north of the precinct wall linear property plots were identified containing the remains of medieval and post-medieval domestic and industrial activity, including tanning and cess pits lined with the dismantled remains of the abandoned abbey structures.

A major programme of post-excavation works were carried out including specialists analyses and dating of all archaeological remains. The excavation findings are significant in helping us to understand the layout and extent of the lost monastic house, and these have been extensively shared at conferences, seminars (listen here) and in notable publications, such as Medieval Dublin XVIII.