Dublin excels at Old Man Pubs. You can find them in every corner of the city; some are more scuffed-but-well-loved, like Briody’s, while others maintain their fine Victorian interiors, like The Hut, with a range of everything in between. Gaffney & Son, more commonly known as Gaffney’s, is very much at the ‘high Victorian’ end of the spectrum, but it has all the classic Old Man Pub features. There’s a bit of horse racing on, lots of Guinness, plenty of regulars and a generally calm, quiet atmosphere* in traditionally ‘pubby’ surroundings. The wood and walls are dark, the glass cut, the snugs cosy and the high-top tables are often newspaper-covered. But while it has all the Old Man Pub features, nothing about Gaffney’s feels unwelcoming – quite the opposite.
There’s a warm welcome, and not one, but two local independent beers offerings: Hope and O’Hara’s are always well-kept here. The bar serves two separate sections, each with their own respective snugs and other seating, and there are lots of little corners to duck into if you’re looking for that quiet solo pint. And it’s interesting to note that while everything you see now is very much hearkening back to the late 19th century, this is, in fact, an older pub – the original building(s) is/are Georgian, and its first license dates back to the early 18th century.
Our one knock on many Old Man Pubs is that they rarely offer any beers beyond the usual Guinness and Heineken (though to be fair, it’s usually an excellent Guinness from scrupulously clean tap lines), but as mentioned above, at Gaffney’s, there is good support for other choices, plus Beamish as another stout option. This beer selection, combined with the attractive interior, might just make it the perfect Dublin Old Man Pub.
Where: 5 Fairview Strand, Clontarf West, Dublin, D03 W5H0
Access from the city centre: Buses 14, 15, 27; DART to Clontarf Road
Food: Crisps
Sport: Horse racing, football, GAA, etc
TVs: Quite a few around the pub
Music: Bit of an MOR playlist, but there’s periodic live music
Family-friendliness: The Strand House up the street is a better option, but kids could get a pre-match Coke here
Pub-crawl-ability: Low, with only Clonliffe House around the corner and The Strand House is almost next door; longer walk to The Yacht Bar in Clontarf
Local sites of note: Fairview Park, Croke Park, Clontarf Promenade, Casino Marino
Haunted: No ghosts, but many portraits of past patrons
Other notes: The beer garden at the back is more of a smoking area, but it’s surprisingly spacious; dogs welcome
Socials: Instagram, Facebook
* But not on days when there’s an event at Croke Park. You have been warned.
This week’s pub is one that we’ve both been asked to profile repeatedly, and, in nearly equal measure, begged not to reveal it as a secret hidden gem. Is it possible to satisfy both of these audiences? Let’s find out – and so, we venture back to Marlborough Street, home to 
Also unlike many other Old Man Pubs, there was an independent beer option: Kinnegar’s Scraggy Bay. In some pubs that don’t have that kind of turnover for non-Guinness options, they aren’t always as fresh, but there were no such issues here. Guinness was, of course, plentiful, but there were many pints of lager being consumed, too – it is slightly unusual to see Tuborg on one of the taps in a Dublin pub, but I have a soft spot for many Carlsberg products, so it was quite welcome. The décor is, again, by no means fancy, but it’s very well-kept: red and cream paint, lighter wood tones and simple brass lamps on the bar. The crowd was clearly mostly regulars, and although most were deeply invested in the multiple channels of horse racing, there were other long-running conversations, too.
And while it may be true that this is not the cleanest nor most well-kept part of Dublin, that is presumably part of what keeps the tourists away, Georgian architecture notwithstanding. And although some parts of Reddit may be thoroughly convinced that we’re all just waiting to get murdered north of the Liffey, there are signs of positive development; newer pubs like The Morris Bar, just a short walk away, suggest that things are slowly improving. But for a pub like Briody’s that’s been here for over a century in various guises, it seems to be content to keep its current mix of regulars and semi-regulars who drop in whenever they are in town.
Although I’ve lived an extremely brief walk from James Gill’s Corner House for over 4 years, I have never managed to be going past when it was open – until now. Its ‘regular’ opening hours are nothing of the sort, but that’s part of this pub’s mythology. Gill’s Pub opens when Gill’s Pub decides to do so. So, what’s it like?
As mentioned, the opening hours are…erratic at best. But if the door is open, you’ll find the walls lined with match-day programs and event posters from previous games and concerts (for those of us who live nearby, we can simply hear everything in the garden – a blessing or a curse, depending on the fixture or artist). But inside there is also the mural of 
But during Behan’s youth, this area wasn’t merely residential – 
Some Dublin pubs are spoken about in slightly hushed tones, with an air of wonder; when you admit you haven’t been to one of those ‘classics,’ there are frequently two standard responses: ‘ah, you must, it's wonderful,’ or ‘well, I know it’s a certain type of a place,’ which may sound non-committal, but it conveys much more. And so while I’ve been told again and again that I ‘must go’ to The Lord Edward, also hearing the second line nearly as frequently had made me somewhat apprehensive. On the face of it, this is silly; what could be intimidating about a pub that is clearly beloved by so many? And I hasten to add this isn’t the sort of place that has a clear demographic type that would be genuinely something to avoid; I used to live near a fairly notorious football hooligan pub in London in the 1990s, and while it was my closest watering hole, the fact that I would walk nearly a mile to the Wetherspoons up the road instead should say everything about that.
But as I sat with my pint of Beamish (yes, I am aware that the Guinness was brewed just a short walk away, I’m just a sucker for Beamish and am glad it seems to be reappearing around town), listening to snatches of conversation here and there, I struggled to put my finger on just what it was about The Lord Edward that made it feel less ‘for me’ than the aforementioned 
And there’s much to be said for an Old Man Pub; there are plenty of friendly regulars (largely, though not entirely, from that specific demographic), quite often a more affordable pint and a some generally comfortable spots to sit and relax. There may not be any craft beer – the closest The Boh gets is with a few broadly-interchangeable Franciscan Well and Open Gate IPAs – but as the vast majority of their patrons are here for the Guinness and Beamish, it’s hardly surprising. First, though, a bit of context.
More properly known as McGeough’s – The Bohemian, and situated on one side of Doyle’s Corner (opposite, er, 
