Printed pages stuck to the signs for Racket Hall simply say "closed", while steel fencing surrounds the former country house hotel outside Roscrea, once renowned for its hospitality for those travelling the old Limerick to Dublin road, but now home to 160 International Protection Applicants.
One year after heated protests that lasted ten weeks, and included violent clashes between demonstrators and gardaí, Racket Hall is quiet, apart from the noise of passing traffic.
A few cars and children's outdoor toys in the car park point to its changed role but what happened after "the riots" as one of the hotel's residents described them?
Kemmi, not her real name, fled Nigeria with her three children last February, arriving first in Dublin where she registered with the International Protection Office before being transferred to Roscrea as protests continued outside the hotel.
Speaking to RTÉ's Drivetime, she recalls hearing locals "needed their hotel" and "had enough in Roscrea" as other Racket Hall residents who were among the first arrivals told her they and their kids were "scared and felt really bad, thinking what have they got themselves into?".
However, Kemmi said she never encountered negativity in Roscrea, with locals offering her help like lifts if she "misses a bus".
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She smiled as she said she often wonders if "these are the same people who were protesting" last year.
Currently studying for an adult education course in healthcare support with a view to "working in a nursing home or HSE facility", Kemmi was on a break from classes when I met her and other Racket Hall residents.
We met at the local "Welcome Group" where volunteers host refugees and asylum seekers for "tea and a chat, help with application forms" and local services or to avail of donations of food, clothing and toys given by the public, according to chairman Andrew Walsh who runs a local bus company in Roscrea and is part of the Church Pastoral Committee.
"It wasn't a good sight," he said, referring to scenes from the Racket Hall protests last January, it "didn't portray Roscrea as a good place to be".
A lot of people said gardaí were "heavy-handed", he added, referring to the violent clashes four days into the protest as the first IPA families arrived "taking kids in through the barricades" while one protester was arrested.
Mr Walsh is clear in his view that things could have been different if there was "good communication out there" to tell people "what was happening, why there were families coming in, it's going to happen anyway".
Through the group, he said it has heard about integration happening "through schools and there's a lot of them working" in meat factories or security jobs so "it can't be any harm for the economy in Roscrea either", he added, even if they "still don't have a local hotel".
Simon, not his real name, fled Nigeria with his family after the murder of "a close relative" and threats in which his "wife and children were held at gunpoint".
He said he came to Ireland as it's a "safe country".
Recalling the bonfires, protesters and placards when they arrived at Racket Hall, Simon said the signs said "Roscrea is full", they "didn't want more migrants, we were scared".
However, he added the protesters "weren't really attacking us" and other people told us "we shouldn't mind" because there's "still a lot of space in Roscrea".
One year on, Simon explained how he works in a local meat factory, his wife has a cleaning job, the "children enjoy school" and they "feel welcome", describing Roscrea as a "good place, a cool place" where they would be happy to stay.
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Many locals I meet in Roscrea are reluctant to speak publicly when I mention Racket Hall, but some are still annoyed by "what they (the government) done".
Acknowledging the hotel was privately owned and offered to the State to house IPAs, many are still critical of the way the facility was accepted for this purpose as it was the only hotel in the town and fully functioning right up until the announcement that it would become a State accommodation centre and the night the protests began.
The "town has suffered" I'm told by many, "we want that hotel back if it's possible at all" said one man who told me he was part of the protest outside it.
His wife said Roscrea has "400 above in the convent, 160 in Racket Hall, the mother and baby home (former Sean Ross Abbey) is full, it's too much".
Another man said the town is being "overrun", though he accepted many of the IPAs and refugees in Roscrea are working and said, "we need a certain amount".
Two girls in their late teens told me they were not part of the protest as they "welcome everyone".
"There's nowhere to go for funerals, weddings, communions" is a common response on Castle Street as one man told me locals now have to go to "Birr, Nenagh or Templemore".
The town has "nowhere to bring your partner for a meal out at night" said another passerby outside the now derelict Grants Hotel building across from Roscrea's historic castle.
Understood to be vacant for 11 years, this is the building the government agreed "in principle" to fund as a "community hotel" as politicians came under fire for a lack of consultation before Racket Hall's sudden closure.
Tipperary County Council was given €150,000 for a feasibility study to look into its possible use for this purpose with the process due to be completed in February, according to a council spokesperson who added the study is unaffected by the 24-bed building being placed on the open market with for sale signs appearing recently.
Some locals are cynical that the community hotel plan "will ever go ahead".
Local Labour TD Alan Kelly described the funding of the feasibility plan as a "stupid waste of taxpayers' money" aimed at "placating local anger" over Racket Hall. He added, "two wrongs don't make a right".
However, local Fianna Fáil Councillor Michael Smith, who proposed the idea, believes it can still happen as a new type of "social enterprise" that would "rejuvenate Castle Street" and "bring the community together in a very positive way".
Roscrea Chamber of Commerce said that replacing the former 40-bed Racket Hall with a 24-bed facility at Grants would not fill the void left in the town with just "nine en-suite beds now available for overnight stays" in the area, but said it would be a "step in the right direction".
Local estate agent and Chamber President Séamus Browne said there is still a "definite economic loss" to the local golf club and other hospitality businesses, as there would be in "any town to lose their only hotel".
He called on the Government "not to consider functioning hotels" or the only hotel in a town as an IPAS centre in future.
"That option should be taken off the table," he said.
One year on from the Racket Hall protests in Roscrea, the auctioneer said it was "obviously damaging" to the town.
"What did it achieve at the end of the day" he asked, adding the hope that it can be "returned to the town as a hotel" when the State contract comes to an end.
Asked about the contract duration, a spokesperson for the Department of Integration said it "will engage with private providers who state an interest in renewing a contract in order to ensure value for money and provide an effective accommodation system".
However, Roscrea Welcome Group Chairman Andrew Walsh said lessons should be learned from Racket Hall.
"It can't happen again," he said, if things like that happen it is going to "give different towns and villages such a bad name" and there's going to be protests starting again.
He added he hopes the Government will look back on that chapter and say "we can't have that happen" again.
