A grim and imposing presence on the Crumlin Road in north Belfast, the former prison known as Crumlin Road Gaol operated for almost a century and a half before closing in 1996 and reopening as one of the city's most compelling heritage attractions. Designed by the architect Charles Lanyon and completed in 1845, the gaol was built in the radial style favoured in the Victorian era, with wings of cells fanning out from a central hub, and it held men, women and children over the course of its histo.....

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.....

Opened in 1999 as Northern Ireland's first purpose-built gay venue, the Kremlin is Belfast's longest-running and best-known LGBTQ+ nightclub. Located on Donegall Street in the city's Cathedral Quarter, it adopts a tongue-in-cheek Soviet theme, complete with a statue of Lenin above its entrance, and has spent more than two decades as a flagship of the city's gay scene, welcoming a mixed and inclusive crowd from across the community and beyond. The venue is organised into several connected spaces.....

First opened in 1987 by former Harp Bar owner Patrick Lennon, the Limelight has grown into one of Belfast's best-loved live-music and club complexes, on Ormeau Avenue in the city centre. Limelight 2 is the original room at the heart of the venue, a space that has hosted touring bands and club nights for well over three decades. The wider complex, now run by promoters MCD and Shine Productions, takes in the larger purpose-built Limelight 1, the adjoining Katy's Bar and an outdoor terrace known a.....

Set inside a former bonded whiskey warehouse in Belfast's Cathedral Quarter, the Oh Yeah Music Centre is Northern Ireland's dedicated hub for music. Founded to champion, support and showcase local talent, it combines a licensed live performance venue with rehearsal rooms, recording facilities, a cafe and office space for music businesses, all spread across three floors of a characterful historic building in the heart of the city's cultural district. The centre opened in 2007 with an inaugural e.....

One of the oldest public parks in Belfast, Ormeau Park spreads its lawns, trees and paths along the bank of the river to the south of the city centre. It has been a green retreat for the people of the city for over a century. The park was opened in the 1870s on the former grounds of a great house, when the city was growing fast and parks were laid out for the health and pleasure of the people. It was among the first of its kind in the city. The land had once been the demesne of a noble family,.....

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 .....

The last White Star Line ship afloat anywhere in the world, the SS Nomadic is preserved in the Belfast dock where she was built. A small, elegant vessel, she was the tender that carried first and second class passengers out to the Titanic. She was built by Harland and Wolff in Belfast and launched in 1911, on a slipway beside those used for the Olympic and the Titanic. Her job was to ferry passengers, mail and baggage from the harbour at Cherbourg out to the great liners, which were too large .....

Under a long Victorian roof of brick, iron and glass, St George's Market is one of the last surviving covered markets of its kind in Ireland. It stands near the river Lagan, a short walk from the centre of Belfast. The hall was built in the 1890s on a site that had held a market for centuries, replacing an open-air market with a grand permanent building. Its tall arched front and rows of iron columns inside are typical of the confident public architecture of the late Victorian city. Over its .....