News
How we work | 18 June 2025
How we work: Stories and History
We want our work to build lasting connections between people and the place they live.
Our programmes create opportunities for people to connect personally and genuinely with each other and their city, sharing their thoughts and ideas about Dublin, their local communities, and culture. We have many types of programmes and they all do this in both different and similar ways, whether it's a programme of listening, making, trying out something creative, or visiting a cultural building.
A common thread through all of our programmes is story. Everyone has a story or a history, of who and where they are from. When we share or discover more about our own personal and collective stories, they help us to form and deepen our connections to each other and the places we live.
At the Culture Company we offer a wide range of history and heritage programmes and activities, all designed around stories. Whether that is story telling, story listening, story gathering, or story sharing - each activity is an invitation to people to discover more about their own histories or the history of the city.
Some examples of how we engage with people around history include a guided tour at 14 Henrietta Street; a history workshop for children or an evening talk about local heritage as part of our Culture Connects programme at Richmond Barracks or through the annual Dublin Festival of History which takes place over 3 weeks in September/October with over 300 separate events; memory sharing through oral history gathering such as Your Tenement Memories; a visit to one of the city’s museums or archives with our Culture Club programme; our childrens’ ‘Hidden Histories’ trail; or delving into an area of historic interest with one of the city’s Historians in Residence.
Activities take place the length and breadth of the city - in the two cultural buildings we run and across neighbourhoods in community centres, libraries, schools, and other cultural spaces, galleries, archives and museums. The six Dublin City Historians in Residence travel around the city, bringing engagement with history to Dublin’s neighbourhoods as they connect with groups around personal histories, local history, walking trails and more. The variety of offerings comes from what we learn from listening to people and it enables us to offer experiences that have relevance and resonance in people’s lives, while recognising that everyone connects with culture and history differently.
Our history and heritage programmes benefit the city as well as those who take part. Our team of tour guides, historians, social historians, historians for children, workshop facilitators and wider teams with expertise in history and heritage, are all a great asset to how Dubliners and those who call the city home can connect with its rich history. By understanding individual experiences and stories about life in Dublin, we can better understand and imagine the city's future. And by joining in, discovering and sharing stories of Dublin’s people and places, we can build stronger connections to our communities and boost overall wellbeing.