Waterside and country piles around Ireland to dream about. Here are some of the finest homes on the market
Agent:
Matt O'Sullivan
Asking price:
€725,000
This
charming three-bedroom home
extends to 162sq m (1,743sq ft) and offers views of the sea and Tully Mountain. For swimmers, the C3-rated house is just a short walk from Ross Beach. The bright, modern home is cocooned in a bucolic setting with fresh, modern interiors. It is about a 15-minute drive from both Clifden and Letterfrack.
Inish Reach, Tievegarriff, Moyard, Co Galway
Inish Reach: Dining area
Inish Reach: Kitchen
Inish Reach: Sitting area
Clonhugh Lodge, Multyfarnham, Co Westmeath
Agent:
Savills & Goffs
READ MORE
Asking price:
€8 million
This
45-hectare Co Westmeath estate
comprises a period-style mansion with six bedroom suites, extending to 1,115sq m (12,000sq ft), a cinema, a swimming pool and staff accommodation. With extensive manicured grounds hived off from the world by mature woodlands, the property enjoys beautiful views over Lough Olwen. The indoor pool and spa offer its residents the five-star hotel experience all year round.
Aerial view of Clonhugh Lodge, Multyfarnham, Co Westmeath
Clonhugh Lodge: Exterior
Clonhugh Lodge: Entrance hall
Clonhugh Lodge: Principal suite bedroom
Clonhugh Lodge: Pool area
Lobster Cottage, Raheen, Union Hall, West Cork
Agent:
Charles McCarthy
Asking price:
€695,000
Offering gorgeous views of the harbour with Rineen woods in the distance, this
three-bedroom detached home
, extending to 167sq m (1,797sq ft), is just a short walk from Reen pier and the sea wall, where there's a coffee dock and mobile sauna. Castletownshend is about a 15-minute drive, while Cork airport is about an hour and 20 minutes' drive away.
Aerial view of harbour
Lobster Cottage, Raheen, Union Hall, West Cork
Bridlewood, Forenaughts Little, Naas, Co Kildare
Agent:
Sherry FitzGerald Country Homes
Asking price:
€4.95 million
This
six-bedroom wisteria-clad home
, extending to 245sq m (2,636sq ft), is just nine kilometres from Naas, and occupies almost 14 acres of landscaped grounds. Built about 25 years ago with a neo-Georgian facade, the home offers the elegance of an older period home while also providing contemporary comforts and a B energy rating. The estate includes a two-storey office pavilion and a two-bedroom coach house, while the grounds feature formal gardens, woodlands and a river.
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Wisteria-clad home with American-style luxury interiors on 14-acre estate outside Naas for €4.95m
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]
Bridlewood House, Forenaughts Little, Naas
Bridlewood House: Kitchen
Bridlewood House: Livingroom
Bridlewood House: Patio
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'I have never heard anyone calling Carlow a county town,' reflects Conal O'Boyle, editor of the weekly Carlow Nationalist. The paper was founded in 1883, and its office at Hanover Road is the same as newsrooms everywhere: stacks of papers scattered around, a phone ringing, and the intangible sense of deadlines in the atmosphere. 'The idea of what a town in Ireland is, let alone a county town, has changed so much,' says reporter Marie Boran. 'For instance, there is no need any more to come into a county town to do your shopping. Nearly every small town has an Aldi or a Lidl now. I personally have no loyalty to any county when it come to shopping. Carlow doesn't have a TKMaxx, there is no sushi restaurant, there is only a small Boots ...' 'Tullow Street used to be the main shopping street in Carlow, but it maybe doesn't have the same attraction for shoppers now that it once had,' says O'Boyle. 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'If you look at Dublin Street, there are a lot of artisan shops there, but they are opening and closing all the time,' says Boran. Dublin Street is one of Carlow's oldest and most historic streets. It contains the bones of once-grand and large Georgian houses, and was clearly impressive architecturally in the past. It still is a remarkable street, even though some of the buildings are now unoccupied or derelict, awaiting a kind of new lives. There are some landmark buildings on the street, including the Old Assembly Rooms. The Assembly Rooms on Dublin Street, Carlow town. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill This building dates from the later 18th century, and as the name suggests, was constructed as a place for social gatherings. Dinners, dances, lectures and concerts were held here. The building was inherited by playwright George Bernard Shaw in 1899 from a family member. Shaw subsequently gave it to the people of Carlow town. One person who still lives on Dublin Street is Betty O'Gorman (89), who is from a third-generation Carlow family. She ran the restaurant Beams and a wine and cheese delicatessen at a premises on the street with her late husband Peter for many years. She continues to live over the former restaurant. 'It was a coaching inn, as far back as 1766,' she says. 'It must be nearly 50 years ago that we opened the first deli in Carlow, The Wine Tavern. We sold smoked salmon from Flanagan in Waterford, and wheels of Wexford cheddar cheese and wine. We supplied pubs and restaurants in Dublin with wine, including Patrick Guilbaud.' O'Gorman was born on Montgomery Street in the town, just off Dublin Street. We are talking over tea in the Seven Oaks Hotel. Part of the hotel was originally a house called Greenbank, which O'Gorman remembers. 'Miss Molly used to be upstairs playing her harp. My mother used to send us to buy apples from the gardener of the house,' she recalls. O'Gorman also remembers when the sugar beet factory was in production. 'It was the first real industry in Carlow, and it made the town because there was very little employment then. Men worked shifts in the factory. I'd be reading in bed and I'd hear them coming off the midnight shift: what sounded like hundreds of bikes going past my window.' Declan McDonald outside his menswear shop, Macs, on Tallows Street, Carlow town, Co Carlow. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill Dublin Street, Carlow town. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill She also remembers when a cattle mart was held in the middle of the town, and seeing cattle herded along the streets to where the Fairgreen shopping centre is now located. 'Everyone knew everyone else in those days; they all lived over the shops, apart from the big shopkeepers. Some Catholics wouldn't have shopped in Shaws because it was Protestant-owned. I miss the people who owned the shops. There are not many of us who live on the street now.' Declan MacDonald's family have owned Macs Menswear on Tullow Street for decades. His son Cian is at the front counter as I come in through the handsome mahogany door. 'That door is there since 1948,' Declan MacDonald says, when he has finished serving a customer who was in to buy casual trousers and a sweatshirt. 'It came out of some shop in Dublin. When we put in a new shop front, it was made to go around the door.' I ask MacDonald what he thinks are the elements that make Carlow a county town. 'The independent traders,' he says. According to MacDonald, the last three years have been 'phenomenal' for business, contrary to the story of many other such shops around the country. [ Ireland's county towns: 'There were 300 people living on this street. Now it's 17' Opens in new window ] 'Fashions and colours and styles will change, but the main thing that won't change is service. We know a lot of our customers, so we can offer personal service, and chat away while we are at it. Carlow is the second-smallest county in Ireland so it's not hard to know a lot of people. 'You need to be able to adapt when serving people. One customer could be in because of a funeral, while the next would be looking to get togged out for a wedding. You need be able to adjust.' [ The ancient Irish town battling against decline: 'It used to be the centre of things, but those days are gone now' Opens in new window ] Colleague Seamus Kinsella is on a day off today and not in the shop, but MacDonald tells me he has been working at Macs since 1974. Is it possible that anyone else in the country could have been working in the same shop for 51 years? It's only later, when I have left Carlow, that I remember my parents lived for a time in Carlow town at the start of their marriage. My late father wore either a suit, or a shirt, tie and sweater almost the entirety of his long life. It struck me that he and my mother would almost certainly have been through the same front door of Macs that I myself had gone through that day, to choose some clothes for him during the years they lived therei. It's completely possible that Declan MacDonald's father, Tom, served them: a line of service that continues to this day. Series concludes
