A ceremony will take place on Wednesday (11 October) in the Education Centre in Blackhall Place to mark the opening of the Moya Quinlan Lecture Theatre.

The theatre is being named after the Law Society’s first woman president (1980/81), who died in 2019.

The event is one of a number that are being held to mark the centenary of the first admission of women to the Roll of Solicitors in Ireland.

Blackhall role

Moya Quinlan (née Dixon) was born on 28 June 1920 and was educated at Sion Hill College in Blackrock, Dublin. She was admitted to the Roll of Solicitors on 9 July 1946.

She became the first female Council member of the Law Society in 1969, and was re-elected for the next 45 years.

Moya Quinlan also played a key role in the acquisition of the Blackhall Place premises.

“In all my years of practice, I have never felt I was either special or that I was in any way unique: I was just a solicitor who happened to be a woman, that’s basically it,” she told The Irish Times in a 2012 interview.

Law Society President Maura Derivan will unveil the newly named theatre, and representatives of the Quinlan family will be present – including Moya’s son Michael, who is also a past president of the Law Society.