The structure consists of two parallel stone walls, each 0.7 metres thick and 4 metres high, running east to west for about 9.2 metres with a 5-metre gap between them. A simple, flat-headed doorway, measuring one metre wide, pierces the northern wall at its western end, whilst narrow slit windows punctuate the enclosure walls immediately to the north and south.

This gatehouse served as the abbey’s first line of defence and reception, manned by a porter who, according to architectural historian Roger Stalley, wasn’t always known for extending the warmest of welcomes to visitors. The upper portions of the structure collapsed sometime after 1839, leaving us with the substantial lower walls that hint at what must have been an imposing entrance to the abbey precincts.

Today, these ruins are protected under a preservation order from 1986, recognising their importance as part of Ireland’s monastic heritage. The gatehouse remains offer a tangible connection to the daily life of medieval Corcomroe, where every visitor, whether pilgrim, merchant, or wanderer, would have first encountered the abbey through this carefully controlled entrance, subject to the scrutiny and temperament of its guardian.