Soaking up the experience of Birr vintage week

It was an all too-familiar story of the summer at Birr, Co Offaly, where the town was attempting to open its 39th Vintage Week and Arts Festival at the weekend.

Rain. Inches of it. Electrical storms briefly blacked out the town three times and the torrential rain resulted in Sunday's cancellation of the nearby Tullamore Agricultural Show, one of the biggest in the country.

With a programme heavy on outdoor events, Saturday, traditionally one of the festival's flagship days, was literally a washout. The cricket match with 1744 rules and croquet on the lawn of Birr Castle was cancelled: the lawn was completely sodden.

Although stall-holders tried their best to remain cheerful, attendance at the olde time traditional fair in the castle courtyard proved to be more of an endurance than a pleasure for all involved as the volume of rain increased by the minute.

For the children, parents and spectators who turned up for the children's vintage costume competition at the castle courtyard, the entire time was spent huddling under a stone arch in the castle for shelter.

Those adults unfortunate enough to be wearing period costume of the kind that trails on the ground - and there were many - were bedraggled and soaked. Flimsy parasols were jettisoned for modern golf umbrellas.

So what is defined as "vintage" and what vintage period does Birr celebrate?

Michelle de Forge, the festival's chair, admits that "vintage is a bit of a broad definition".

The festival's vintage theme was originally chosen since Birr is a heritage town, containing many well-preserved Georgian houses, and an astonishing eight mills.

"When it comes to costumes, we're probably looking for pre-1900," de Forge says, "but as time has passed, the definition of what a vintage car is has changed. Now, it could be a 1970s car."

The festival tries to use some of the town's heritage buildings in a new way.

The key visual arts event for this year, Synesthesia, a collection of shows of the work of 19 artists, had its main group show in the town's famine workhouse. A little way out of town, the derelict and partly ruined building proved to be an eerily atmospheric setting for a series of art works based on responses to the building's unhappy history.

Jeremy Deadman's room contained only a clock and a recording of a beating entitled Flayed; Mark Cullen's Night Sky 53 Degrees North had tiny lights embedded in a ceiling, suggestions of a wider world beyond the claustrophobia of an enforced workhouse community.

Saturday was also the day when buskers were competing in town for the Dom Egan cup and prize money. Given the weather, the priority for all was finding a sheltered spot. Every covered alleyway, shop porch and archway was sought out.

Random Band from Roscrea, with band members Robert Flynn (17), Billy Jones (19) and Mark Cummins (20), had found a sheltered alley space on Main Street and were gallantly playing their guitars.

Meanwhile, although there was no parade of entrants in the children's vintage costume competition in the castle yard, there were winners. Winner of the first prize in the under-10 category was Eamon Corcoran, dressed as Sir Walter Raleigh.

Birr Vintage Week and Arts Festival continues until Friday. Local TD Olwyn Enright will open an antique and fine art fair at the County Arms Hotel today at 2.30pm.