Inistioge Kilkenny
Inistioge is one of the most beautiful village destinations in Ireland, a small settlement on the River Nore in County Kilkenny whose tree-lined village square, the medieval bridge of ten arches across the Nore, the ruined Augustinian priory and the beautiful wooded valley setting create a destination of considerable charm that has attracted film companies and artists who recognise in it the perfect image of a traditional Irish village. The ten-arched bridge of 1763 crossing the river below the village is one of the finest examples of Georgian bridge building in Leinster.
The wooded valley of the Nore at Inistioge, with the river visible through the trees from the village and the walking in the woodlands of the Woodstock estate above providing access to the extraordinary nineteenth-century formal gardens that are being restored from dereliction, creates a destination of unusual depth that rewards extended exploration. The Woodstock Gardens, designed in the Italian and French styles in the nineteenth century and currently being restored by the local council, contain remarkable tree specimens and structural gardens of considerable ambition.
The Augustinian priory above the village, founded in the thirteenth century and dissolved in the sixteenth, retains its tower and some church walls in a setting of ivy-covered charm above the bridge and the village square. Inistioge appears in the Tina Turner film What's Love Got to Do with It and in several other productions that have used the village as the ideal of a Kilkenny river village.