PadloveHa'penny Bridge, the vow that crosses the Liffey
Dublin's white footbridge, where your promise weighs nothing.
Over the Liffey, a slender white cast-iron footbridge has joined Dublin’s two banks since 1816. The Ha’penny Bridge is one of the city’s tenderest images, the one you cross together, in no hurry. Padlove extends the gesture: your love lock stays sealed there forever, with both your names, without ever weighing on its arch.
The story of the place
Opened in 1816, the Ha’penny Bridge was the first pedestrian bridge thrown across the Liffey. Its cast-iron structure, an unmistakable white, traces an elegant arch in the heart of Dublin. Two centuries on, it remains one of the city’s best-loved landmarks, crossed every day by those passing from one bank to the other.
Its nickname comes from a time when you paid to cross it. A former toll bridge, it cost a half-penny — a halfpenny — for each crossing. The name stuck long after the toll disappeared, an affectionate way of naming this place the people of Dublin have made their own.
For a long time, love locks clung to its railings. To preserve the cast iron and its original design, the city chose to remove them. The gesture, though, does not disappear: it simply changes form and now lives on the map, never on the grille.
Why seal your love lock here
- Carry on the ritual of Dublin’s lovers, without a gram on the historic cast iron.
- Seal your vow with both your names, forever, at the very spot of the Ha’penny Bridge.
- Give your love lock a place the city will never remove: the Padlove map.
Here, the physical locks were removed by the city to protect the 1816 cast iron. With Padlove, the promise weighs nothing on the footbridge: it stays sealed on the map, legible with both your names.
Continue the journey
- Pont des Arts — The bridge of lovers from all over the world, made eternal.
- Pont de l’Archevêché — The narrowest of Paris bridges, the widest for hearts.
- Passerelle Léopold-Sédar-Senghor — From the Musée d’Orsay to the Tuileries garden, a pas de deux.