Grafton Street, and its environs, is the heart of Dublin.

Early on Saturday, my sister and I headed to Grafton Street to get my mother a new mobile phone as she somehow misplaced her cell at the hospital when she was having her cataract removed.  Not such a big deal, really, as you can get a very basic phone for about €25 and as she only uses it for emergencies so she uses the ‘top up’ plan which means you can load up as little as €5 at a time.

Anyway, “town” was eerily quite!  I’m not sure if it is due to the travel season being essentially over (i.e. kids are all back at school), the recession, people sleeping in after a late Friday night, all of the above?

Grafton Street is really quite short, and skinny, and was turned into a pedestrian corridor many years ago as it was simply too congested to allow for people and traffic. I do remember years ago when double-deckers actually went down this street!

Brown Thomas (“BT”) is the star of Grafton Street.  It is quite a swanky department store with all the best labels and if you can’t get a leprechaun to make your shoes I can assure you that you will be smitten by BT’s shoe department!  They even have a salon dedicated exclusively to Christian Louboutin, if you are inclined to drop €850 on a pair of new fall booties!!  Recession?  Default?  Who are they talking about?

Later on Saturday, things livened up around town and there was a Hugo Boss fashion show being held on the second floor of BT with plenty of free champagne being passed around.

The joys of ‘window shopping’!

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