Irish Marble Quarry

Their factory is based in the village on the n59 between clifden and galway where joyce s craft shop and art gallery can also be found right across the road from the connemara giant monument.

Irish marble quarry.

One of the finest examples of connemara marble in ireland forms. Located just outside the historic marble city of kilkenny. So when offered a chance to visit the actual factory i jumped at it. The joyce family owns a connemara marble quarry in recess.

Sandstone travertine slate limestone and granite are products of nature and have been quarried from all over the world. The black marble quarry at anglingham was discovered and exploited by stanley ireland in the early 1800s. Connemara marble is over 900 million years old and is unique to ireland. The streamstown marble quarry.

We got to tour a small workshop see the many kinds of raw materials they work with watch an informative video about marble and they we got to shop the. Its use in jewellery can be regarded as one of ireland s indigenous industries and the quarrying of connemara marble is a centuries old endeavour. Streamstown marble quarry in clifden is the oldest of the marble quarries. The joyce name was to become synonymous with connemara marble supplying world famous buildings with the ireland s iconic marble.

Annual extraction rate of 25 000m gross block production hub for irish blue limestone slabs and paving for irish and european markets. A wide range of connemara marble gifts are available there. Streamstown marble quarry letternoosh clifden co. He established a marble yard in the town of galway and employed several workmen who wrought monuments chimney pieces tablets slabs etc advertised his product in newspapers and exported the stone to various irish and british markets.

This quarry is the oldest and most famous of the connemara marble quarries opened commercially in 1822. Stone age man worked the marble from this deposit 4000 years ago and axes made of connemara marble are in the collection of the national museum of ireland. Kilkenny marble or kilkenny black marble is a fine grained very dark grey carboniferous limestone found around county kilkenny in ireland in the butlersgrove formation a lower carboniferous limestone that contains fossils of brachiopods gastropods crinoids and corals. I bought some connemara marble pieces when i was first in ireland more than 40 years ago and they are still lovely.

The first and main source was the black quarry in the townlands of archersgrove and gallowshill just south of kilkenny. We own and operate the oldest marble quarry which was first opened in the 19th century and visited in 1903 by king edward vii and queen alexandra during the royal tour of connemara.