This colourful fish replaces graffiti reading “Don’t Listen 2 SF Traiters” (in the Peter Moloney collection) in Fountain Street, Strabane.
The cause or sponsoring group is unknown – please comment/get in touch if you have any information.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06216
Caitlin McLaughlin died suddenly on June 24th, 2023. She collapsed from a heart attack as she walked to the bus station in Belfast to return home from a music festival at which she had taken ecstasy (BBC). A requiem mass was held in Galliagh on the 28th (BelTel) and the mural shown here was launched in Brookdale Park on October 27th, 2023, which would have been Caitlin’s 17 birthday (Belfast Live).
“I saw you all, my family & friends/the day God took me home,/I smiled, I cried, I felt so proud/You didn’t let me go alone//To all my friends, please listen now/To what I have to say,/Please don’t leave your loved ones/the way I did that day//I’m with the angels in heaven now/and with our we[e] Kyle too,/But often I look down and sigh/For I’d rather be there with you//Forget me not/XO”
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06161 T06160 [T06159]
“A scramble for the window seat, steam curls as the whistle blows. Clickety clack train on track.”
The York Road railway station was a few minutes’ walk below Ritchie Street – site of this wall-paintings and decorations (and Pearly’s Place, the adjacent community garden) – until it closed in 1992. The original line was to Ballymena and then Coleraine and London-/Derry, with service to Carrick and Larne added later. It was badly damaged in WWII and its final demise came with the opening of Belfast Central in 1976 (WP). It was replaced with Yorkgate in 1992 which no longer serves as a terminus (WP), but the line still runs along behind the end of the streets along York Road and the Grove area of the Shore Road.
On the long wall to the right is written “Remember your neighbourhood in the late afternoon sun. The district was a different place then. All you owned was a box full of toys and a smile on your face.”
Ritchie Street, north Belfast
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06106 T06107 T06108 T06110 T06109
Ivan Davis was a DUP and then UUP politician who was a Lisburn borough councillor (and mayor 1991-1993) and member of the Assembly for Lagan Valley from 1998 to 2003, before being ousted in favour of the anti-Agreement Jeffrey Donaldson (BBC). He died in 2020 (BelTel). The stone in his memory is in the garden at the top of Old Warren: “In memory of Ivan Davis O.B.E. Freeman of the city of Lisburn, a dedicated honourable public servant who worked tirelessly for the entire community of Lisburn.”
The boards on the wall were seen previously in 2023’s Conflict To Peace – which includes a colour photograph of the old UDA mural – and 2024’s Faith, Blood, Service, Sacrifice.
Avonmore Park, Old Warren, Lisburn
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06099 T06100 T06101 T06102 T06103 T06104
A grey heron (above) and a kingfisher (below) sit along the banks of the Six Mile Water. The river rises west of Larne and flows through Ballyclare on its way to Lough Neagh.
Abercorn Drive, Ballyclare, but best viewed from the Main Street bridge. Artist unknown.
See also: a street-art tribute to the river Braid in Ballymena.
Nearby in Ballyclare: Dandelions | The Auld Meetin’-Hoose Green.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06093 T06092
T06090 [T06091] T06094
The official title of this piece is ‘The Estate With Love In It’ (Love Ballymena) but the figure at the centre of it appears to be heading toward some faraway land. Nonetheless, efforts are being made by the proud residents (Fb group) to improve the estate, compared to conditions a decade ago – see the short film from 2013 at Poverty & Social Exclusion.
The work is by Carly Wright (web) and Sam McAleese – who also did Beacon Of Hope in the town’s Ballykeel estate, and a piece in Belfast for HTN 2023 – in September 2023, with support from the Doury Road Development Group (Fb) and the Housing Executive.
Alexandra Park, Ballymena
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06069 T06074 T06072 T06071 T06070 T06073
The Flamingo Ballroom was open from 1960 to 1980 and the building was demolished in 2017 (BBC | BelTel) but it is fondly remembered by fans who got to see some of the biggest names in rock and pop, including the Rolling Stones, Chubby Checker, the Everly Brothers, Thin Lizzie, Rory Gallagher, and Pink Floyd, as well as Irish showbands (here is the bill from September 1961).
Here is an image of a sax player with local band the Cossacks with the tall flamingo inside the club – and this provides the inspiration for this street art by Woskerski (web).
Greenvale Street, Ballymena. (The face in the window in the image above belongs to the Goose Herder opposite.)
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06059 T06060 T06058
The Braid River rises in the Antrim hills between Carnlough and The Sheddings. It then flows (west) past Broughshane and Ballymena before joining the Maine and flowing into Lough Neagh. The river is at the centre of this new piece of street art by Shane O’Driscoll (ig) in Ballymoney Street, Ballymena.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06062 T06063 T06061 John Muir
These shutters of a solicitor’s office in Mill Street, Ballymena, are painted with a view of the street from around the turn of the (20th) century.
The original photograph, by photographer Robert French, can be seen in the National Library Of Ireland. French died in 1917, which provides an upper limit for the date of the scene.
In the misty distance is the tower of St Patrick’s (CI) church (WP) and closer to the camera (on the right of the left-hand panel) is the steeple on top of the old town hall, which was originally built in 1684 (one of the old “seven towers” in the town) and most recently replaced in 1928 (WP).
See also Ballymena Town Hall.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06079 T06078
Here are two long panels of images of the sights and activities in and around Ballymena (below some advertising for TeamKit) in the car-park between Ballymoney Street and Broughshane Street.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2025 Paddy Duffy
T06064 T06065
Paddy Duffy Collection 