21 castle hotels
Castle Hotels in Ireland
Real castles and palaces in Ireland where you can book a room for the night.
ireland · Connemara, County Galway
Ballynahinch Castle
The estate where Grace O'Malley married, Richard 'Humanity Dick' Martin founded animal welfare law, and the greatest batsman of the Victorian age came for the salmon — Ballynahinch Castle has been passing between remarkable people since 1546 and is now a hotel anyone can visit for a drink by the river
ireland · Clifden, Connemara, County Galway
Abbeyglen Castle
Built by the founder of Clifden itself for £500 in 1832, later a Protestant orphanage, then cattle shelter ruin — restored as a hotel, and easily confused with a more famous ruin of the same name nearby
ireland · Galway, County Galway
Ballindooley Castle
A rebel Burke stronghold shelled by a British gunboat during the 1916 Easter Rising, and a refuge for Ukrainian families fleeing war in 2021 — today rented whole as a private self-catering castle 10 minutes from Galway city
ireland · Tralee, County Kerry
Ballyseede Castle
A Munster stronghold where the last Earl of Desmond was beheaded after his rebellion against the Crown, later granted to a new family for a single symbolic red rose a year
ireland · Straffan, County Kildare
Barberstown Castle
One of Ireland's oldest continuously inhabited castles, built in 1288 and defended against Gaelic clans for two centuries — later home to Eric Clapton, who jammed with fellow rock stars in its Castle Keep
ireland · Dunleer, County Louth
Barmeath Castle
Still owned by the same family after more than 350 years — a Jacobite baronetcy's seat, with gardens laid out by the celebrated 'Wizard of Durham'
ireland · Ballina, County Mayo
Belleek Castle
Restored from ruin by a merchant navy officer and fossil collector who single-handedly saved it — today it holds one of Ireland's finest private collections of medieval arms, armour and fossils
ireland · Kingscourt, County Cavan
Cabra Castle
Built for one family whose ambition bankrupted them, sold to a wealthier one who renamed it — its last private owner was a British colonial official in Malaysia
ireland · Castlemartyr, County Cork
Castlemartyr Resort
A Knights Templar castle from 1210 stands as an ornamental ruin in the gardens of this resort — the hotel itself is the 17th-century Manor House built by the Boyle family, a genuinely separate building
ireland · Clontarf, Dublin
Clontarf Castle
Sharing its name and site with the site of Brian Boru's decisive 1014 battle against the Vikings — but not the same building, built two centuries after that famous battle was fought here
ireland · Newmarket-on-Fergus, County Clare
Dromoland Castle
The ancestral seat of the O'Brien family, direct descendants of Brian Boru, High King of Ireland — kings of Thomond ruled from this land for centuries before the last king surrendered his crown to Henry VII
ireland · Killiney, County Dublin
Fitzpatrick Castle
A Georgian house occupied by the Black and Tans, the IRA and Free State troops across the Irish Civil War, before two Dublin hoteliers transformed it into a bay-view castle hotel
ireland · Castledermot, County Kildare
Kilkea Castle
Widely considered Ireland's oldest continuously inhabited castle — home for more than 700 years to the FitzGerald Earls of Kildare, whose 'Wizard Earl' is said to return every seven years on a silver-shod white horse
ireland · Drinagh, County Wexford
Killiane Castle Country House & Farm
A 15th-century Norman tower house built by a descendant of the Hay family, still standing on a working Wexford farm more than 500 years later — one of the country's more modest and authentic castle stays
ireland · Ballyfarnon, County Roscommon
Kilronan Castle Estate & Spa
Named for a 6th-century saint said to have founded a church here with his daughter — later the seat of a family that produced a Roscommon Lord Lieutenant, now a lakeside spa resort
ireland · Kinnitty, County Offaly
Kinnitty Castle
A site with a druidic monastery in the 5th century, a Gaelic O'Carroll stronghold, and a High Cross still standing on the grounds — burned by republican forces in 1922 and rebuilt as today's Gothic hotel
ireland · Donegal Town, County Donegal
Lough Eske Castle
The land beside Lough Eske was the seat of the mighty O'Donnell clan of medieval Donegal — their castle ruins still stand apart from today's Victorian hotel, which itself nearly burned down in 1939
ireland · Mohill, County Leitrim
Lough Rynn Castle
The seat of the Earls of Leitrim on the shore of Lough Rynn — a family whose fortunes began with confiscated Cavan land granted to a Cromwellian officer
ireland · Collooney, County Sligo
Markree Castle
The Cooper family's Sligo seat once housed the world's largest refractor lens in an on-site observatory, where an asteroid was discovered in the 1840s — now a small family-run hotel
ireland · Little Island, County Waterford
Waterford Castle
The FitzGeralds held this private island on the River Suir for eight centuries after the Norman invasion — reachable today, as it always has been, only by boat
ireland · Bree, Enniscorthy, County Wexford
Wilton Castle
First recorded in 1247, burned by gunmen during the Irish Civil War in 1923, and left a roofless ruin for more than 80 years — today only its rebuilt south wing has been restored, honestly and openly