A magical new mural appeared in Milford at the weekend. It wasn’t the fairies that painted it though, a group of local children in partnership with renowned mural artist Ciarán Dunlevy developed and created the beautiful new artwork based on a local myth about the Fairy Rock in Grey Rocks estate. It was commissioned by Milford & District Resource Centre, with support from, and as part of, the Earagail Arts Festival.

The concept and design for the mural was developed over a two day workshop with 20 local children and young people taking part. “This is another fantastic addition to the town of Milford, and one which our locals kids led out on”, said Declan Meehan, manager of Milford & District Resource Centre. “We were delighted to be able to bring some of the Earagail Arts Festival to Milford and we are sure that everyone will enjoy the mural for years to come. I would like to thank all the very talented children for their creativity, as well as Ciarán Dunlevy for leading on the project, and Paul McElhinney for allowing us to use his building as our canvas.”

The mural tells the story of a local man named Pat who was walking home to Milford with some friends late one night after attending a fair in Kerrykeel. The men he was with lived down at Milford Quay, so Pat continued on to Milford town by himself. The group had been talking about ghosts and fairies on their walk, and said it was dangerous for Pat to have his stick with him as the fairies at the ‘Fairy Rock’, a large rock in the middle of a field, might think he was going to kill them. Pat said he didn’t believe in fairies at the time, but as he got closer to the time he began to get frightened. 

As he was passing the ‘Fairy Rock’ an army of little men came out of the rock and brought him into it. They kept him inside the rock for three days. His family were worried and kept looking for him, and then three days later he just walked back into the house. When they asked him where he was he told them all about the food he got in the rock, and said it was the loveliest parlour he was ever in. This local legend was found by the artist on the national heritage collection of local folklore and the design of the mural was based on this, with lots of input and ideas from the children.

The mural is located just off the main street in the alleyway between the betting office and the old AIB bank building.