The 1853 Exhibition and the rise of consumer culture in nineteenth century Ireland

Stephanie Rains, Department of Media Studies, Maynooth University, discusses the ways in which the 1853 Exhibition influenced and was influenced by the newly established department stores in Dublin. It will argue that although one of the central aims of the Exhibition was to stimulate industrial production in Ireland, it was actually more influential in encouraging consumption. In this sense, the 1853 Exhibition – held in the same year that the city’s first purpose-built department store opened on Sackville Street (now O’Connell Street) – contributed to the development of consumer culture in Ireland, by providing remarkably similar architectural and cultural spaces in which the middle-classes could admire mass-produced goods.