page_title: Achill Island
section_title: Architecture
hierarchical_section_title: Achill Island / Architecture
caption_attribution_description: Italiano: Desert Village sullo Slievemore, Achill Island.
context_page_description: Achill Island in County Mayo is the largest of the Irish isles, and is situated off the west coast of Ireland. It has a population of 2,700. Its area is 148 km². Achill is attached to the mainland by Michael Davitt Bridge, between the villages of Gob an Choire and Poll Raithní. A bridge was first completed here in 1887, replaced by another structure in 1949, and subsequently replaced with the current bridge which was completed in 2008. Other centres of population include the villages of Keel, Dooagh, Dumha Éige, Dún Ibhir, The Valley and Dugort. The parish's main Gaelic football pitch and secondary school are on the mainland at Poll Raithní. Early human settlements are believed to have been established on Achill around 3000 BC. A paddle dating from this period was found at the crannóg near Dookinella.
  The island is 87% peat bog. The parish of Achill consists of Achill Island, Achillbeg, Inishbiggle and the Corraun Peninsula.
context_section_description: Because of the inhospitable climate, few inhabited houses date from before the 20th century, though there are many examples of abandoned stone structures dating to the 19th century.
  The best known of these earlier can be seen in the "Deserted Village" ruins near the graveyard at the foot of Slievemore. Even the houses in this village represent a relatively comfortable class of dwelling as, even as recently as a hundred years ago, some people still used "Beehive" style houses (small circular single-roomed dwellings with a hole in the ceiling to let out smoke).
  Many of the oldest inhabited cottages date from the activities of the Congested Districts Board for Ireland—a body set up around the turn of the 20th century in Ireland to improve the welfare of the inhabitants of small villages and towns. Most of the homes in Achill at the time were very small and tightly packed together in villages. The CDB subsidised the building of new, more spacious (though still small by modern standards) homes outside of the traditional villages.
  Some of the recent building development (1980 and onwards) on the island does fit as nicely in the landscape as the earlier style of whitewashed raised gable cottages. Many holiday homes have been built but many of these houses have been built in prominent scenic areas and have damaged traditional views of the island while lying empty for most of the year.
caption: The "Deserted Village" at the foot of Slievemore was a booley village; see Transhumance
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