A much-loved fixture of Belfast nightlife, the Empire Music Hall on Botanic Avenue is one of the city's most characterful live-music venues, housed in a Victorian building that began life as a church. Dating from the nineteenth century, the atmospheric room retains the architecture of its origins, with a balcony wrapping around an intimate main hall, and it has spent decades as a beloved home for music, comedy and entertainment in the heart of the university quarter. The venue is spread over se.....

Running through parts of Belfast, the peace walls are barriers built to separate communities during the years of conflict in Northern Ireland. Now covered in murals and messages, they have become a place of reflection and a stop for many visitors. The walls were first put up in the late 1960s, at the start of the long period of strife, to keep apart neighbourhoods of different traditions. They were meant as a temporary measure. Over the decades the barriers grew taller and more numerous, made .....

Twin spires rising over the Falls area mark St Peter's Cathedral, the Catholic cathedral of the Diocese of Down and Connor in west Belfast. For generations its towers have been a familiar sight on the city skyline. They are widely seen as a symbol of homecoming for people from the surrounding district. The church was built to serve the fast-growing Catholic population of 19th-century Belfast, on land given for the purpose. The foundation stone was laid in 1860. It was consecrated in 1866, afte.....

The Botanic Inn, known affectionately as the Bot, is a Victorian pub and bar on the Malone Road in Belfast's Queen's Quarter, close to Botanic Gardens and Queen's University. Trading since 1867, it is a long-established institution and one of the best-known social venues in the south of the city. Noted as an example of Victorian architecture in Northern Ireland, the pub has served generations of Belfast residents through major social and political changes across more than a century and a half. .....

The Devenish Complex is a large bar, restaurant and function venue in the leafy Finaghy area of south Belfast. Combining a grill restaurant, a cocktail and live-music bar and a series of function rooms, it has grown into one of the area's premier venues for events and celebrations. The sprawling complex was acquired by the Conlon Group in 2014 and reopened that July after a multi-million-pound programme of renovation and expansion. The investment created the venue as it is known today, transfor.....

Among the most storied names in Belfast's music scene, the Limelight is a live-music and club complex on Ormeau Avenue that has operated, in various forms, since 1987. It now spans two venues, Limelight 1 and Limelight 2, alongside Katy's Bar and an outdoor terrace. The original Limelight nightclub and its neighbouring Dome bar were opened in 1987 by Patrick Lennon, previously of the Harp Bar. Over time the operation expanded into the adjoining former spring-and-airbrake works, which lent its n.....

Known affectionately as the Grand Dame of Bedford Street, the Ulster Hall is one of the oldest purpose-built concert halls in the UK and Ireland. Built in 1859 and opened on 12 May 1862, the grand Victorian building on Bedford Street in central Belfast was designed by the architect William J. Barre, who also created the city's Albert Clock, to give the rapidly expanding city a large multipurpose venue. On its opening night the local press hailed it as a music hall fit for any artist, and over t.....