Described as "a great dandy of his generation", Desmond Guinness, noted for his piercing blue eyes, lived the gilded life of a fun-loving aristocrat. He was closely related to many of the blue-bloods of Ireland and England, as well as a wide circle who were either Guinness by birth or through marriage.

But as co-founder of the Irish Georgian Society with his first wife Mariga, he also did more than any other person to save some of Ireland's great historic buildings - from stately Castletown House in Co Kildare to crumbling Georgian town houses - from the developer's wrecking ball.