The night the city turned towards culture - especially in Temple Bar

Friday night in Temple Bar and - for a few hours anyway - people were walking into art galleries rather than pubs. The area had given way to something usually chased out of the place by sunset: culture.

It was Culture Night across Dublin, an imitation of events in Paris, Copenhagen and Amsterdam, when those cities' museums and galleries are open into the small hours. Except that this is Dublin's first, tentative experiment.

So most of its venues were closed by 9pm and, apart from the odd glass of wine in some galleries and the drizzle outside, it was to be a dry night.

It may be moving away from its image as a stag and hen party hang-out, but it may be some time before the area's two most famous attractions - drink and culture - can be joined in marriage.

It started at 6pm, when the Culture Bus pulled up outside Dublin Castle, en route for the Irish Museum of Modern Art and then onwards to Farmleigh and back around Collins Barracks. That it was a minibus somewhat betrayed the organisers' expectations.

So there was a little grumbling as half the crowd was left behind; more so when they heard that there was a second bus, but that it had been reserved for that most uncultured of breeds - journalists. Nevertheless, the second bus soon arrived and people boarded with the speed of robbers leaving a bank.

Most of the city's cultural venues had either extended their opening hours or put on special events for the occasion. There were free classes in the Gaiety School of Acting, DJs in the National Gallery and, in Temple Bar's Filmbase, children were engrossed in the "Morphathon" - an animation workshop using clay. "It's brilliant," said Michelle Colfer (11), who had helped make a movie in five minutes. She had already been at the Gaiety School of Acting.

"It's a really fun night," she said.

Across the road in children's cultural centre the Ark, which was hosting a retrospective exhibition, Anu O'Byrne was with her three girls, Olga (11), Sofia (9) and Lilja (6). She wasn't worried about the event only lasting for a few hours.

"Temple Bar isn't suitable for children after nine o'clock anyway. You know how it is," said Anu. And, unlike other European events, she doesn't think a bar in every gallery is an option yet.

"It'll take a couple of years before people trust the idea that everything doesn't have to be a piss-up," she said.

Behind her, half a dozen kids were playing underneath a colourful coat rack.

"We've done both floors," laughed their mothers. "But this is the biggest hit. We've been here for ages." By 8pm, there were far more tourists wandering Temple Bar with Culture Night maps than stag night T-shirts. Aleksandra Prodanoska, a Macedonian working in Dublin, had enjoyed wine and stories at James Joyce House and was wondering what to do next.

But she didn't have much time.

"I thought it would be longer, that it wouldn't close at nine but at 12 or even go on all night. I am surprised by that, so I'm running to catch things before they close. But it is still great."