Free for everyone; the guided tours on Wednesdays at 14:00 from April to October are free and need no booking, meeting inside the gates of the car park. No membership card is needed.
The Trust's page does not say how parking is charged.
OPW lists a car park, where the guided tours meet inside the gates, but publishes no tariff or free statement; visitors and other sources describe easy, free parking with disabled spaces. The entrances are from Con Colbert Road and the South Circular Road at the Phoenix Park end; the memorials are about 300 m west of the car park. OPW names no bus service.
Driving pin: the gardens' car park, where OPW's own pin sits.
The Irish National War Memorial Gardens at Islandbridge, on the south bank of the Liffey opposite the Phoenix Park, are among the most famous memorial gardens in Europe, dedicated to the memory of the 49,400 Irish soldiers who died in the First World War. Sir Edwin Lutyens laid them out on fifty acres at Longmeadows; ex-servicemen drawn equally from the British Army and the Irish National Army built them in the 1930s, and after decades of neglect they were restored and formally opened in 1988. The Stone of Remembrance and the Great Cross of Sacrifice stand on the central lawn between sunken rose gardens, lily ponds, fountains and four granite bookrooms linked by pergolas, which hold the illustrated Harry Clarke manuscripts naming every soldier and open by arrangement. Herbaceous borders, fine trees and spring cherry blossom make it a lovely visit in any season. Entry is free, with guided tours on Wednesday afternoons from April to October, and dogs are welcome on a lead away from the roses and fountains.
The gardens are open all year, Monday to Friday from 08:00 and Saturday and Sunday from 10:00, closing according to daylight hours; OPW prints no closed dates. The bookrooms with Ireland's Memorial Records open by arrangement with the local management (parkmanager@opw.ie). Free guided tours run on Wednesdays at 14:00 from April to October, no booking, meeting inside the car park gates, subject to weather; the last 2026 tours are on 21 and 28 October.
No toilets, cafe or shop. The main paths are wheelchair accessible, but the sunken rose gardens and the platform of the Great Cross have steps, and some paths from the outer entrances are muddy after rain.
Dogs: Pet dogs are welcome under control, on a lead on the central lawns, near water and roads, and not in the rose gardens or around the fountains.
Photo: The sunken rose garden at the Irish National War Memorial Gardens, with two granite bookrooms and a pergola reflected in the lily pond. Dieglop, CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Simmetry_War_Memorial_Gardens.jpg. Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0. Resized and cropped for display; derivatives retain the source licence.
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Dogs, with restrictions
OPW's 'River Walk' along the Liffey bank through the memorial park, free from the car park and the park gates during opening hours; a reviewer recommends it for a stroll or a cycle.
