NecroReview: S4157 Parkwest Tavern

Another one from the 'trawl the list to make sure everything is written up' efforts; this is a pub that was below my office for most of 2007; and which I would occasionally have lunch or after-work pints in - including the last lunch I ever ate in Parkwest when our long delayed office move got approved to be on at 11am on a random weekday - an urgent "last supper" style booking was put in and we were back up and running in the new office in Tallaght by about 4.

Back then, this was called Bennigans and I assumed it was part of the US chain of Irish bars, which announed they were entering Ireland in 2004 with a local franchiser opening branches in 2005. These were still going in 2008, when the US master franchiser entered bankruptcy; but had renamed by time of their own liquidation in 2009.

However, I can find no reference to this having been run by the Irish franchiser; and also this pub was renamed to "Hennigans"; yet the other Bennigans became Brannigans.  

Additionally, the Parkwest branch was opened in December 2004, by the model Abbi Titmus, some time before the two known Bennigans branches, with the Cork opening in 2005 being mentioned as the first in Ireland. 

This makes me suspect this was coincidentally, maybe deliberately, named and may have had to rename due to the other Bennigans existing and having the trademark, rather than rename when they ceased to be Bennigans. As what must have been a seperate entity, it wasn't affected by their bankruptcy, but a gang linked death in 2009 lead to the pubs closure anyway.

However, this doesn't fall in to my "crypt" category of pubs; those that were closed entirely before 2016, as it reopened in the late 2010s as the Parkwest Tavern. This, however, did not reopen after the pandemic. Parkwest has a continually growing population, so I'm surprised nobody has had another go at opening this since, but as it is still licenced it may yet reappear.