President’s Visit

The President of Ireland Mary McAleese chose to visit The Knitting Map on 29th November 2005. This was a huge day for the community of knitters who had spent nearly a year making the work, and the crypt of St.Luke’s was full of people and anticipation. I waited outside in the rain under an umbrella with the poet Thomas McCarthy (who represented Cork 2005) for the President’s cavalcade to arrive on O’Mahony’s Avenue, which is tiny. It was all kinds of extraordinary and the image here of the little girls giving the President flowers was on the front page of the Irish Times the following day.