Well-built school deserves gold star

Tommy Barker looks at a former school which has been renovated and is now on market.

THE Blue Period at the so-called Blue School is over - the century old country school and teacher's house has been given a bright new future.

The former school and dwelling now up for sale was fortunate enough to get Tim and Jill Green in as owners back in the early 1990s.

In a coincidental twist, they both had been school teachers themselves in the UK, so taking on the renovation of a school building in West Cork had an element of busman's holiday about it.

Jill taught languages, Tim had taught art and woodwork, and the latter's skill was very much pressed into service here to match the exceptional quality of the building's original joinery. They are only selling up to move back to the Lake District in England, to a family home: "It's an offer we can't refuse," say the former teachers who worked in Clonakilty's Supervalu store once they got the house's renovation to rights.

Location is near the large co-op base of Lisavaird, four miles west of Clonakilty in West Cork - just up the road from Michael Collins' birth-place. The Four Alls pub is a local landmark, and a beguiling place to drop into - chalk it, and the capacious DIY co-op store, down as local amenities for whoever might buy the Blue School.

An early Spring arrival on the West Cork property market, it is a pretty unique package, which can be wrapped up in or around the approachable €330,000-plus price guide quoted by Henry O'Leary Property Partners in Clonakilty whose website www.hol.ie pays lavish homage to its visual appeal.

A Church of Ireland-owned property, it originally comprised a small two-bedroomed, two-storey residence, built on to the side of a single storey large school room, with 15' high vaulted ceilings and hefty exposed beams.

Jill and Tim worked very much with the feel, character or spirit of the place: it has an honest, direct and simple feel - more Quaker than Shaker.

Timbers are predominantly pitch pine, seen to best effect in doors, architraves and window shutters and beams, while decoration is equally pure: white walls, tiled floors (much of it original), wood floors as well, and in the kitchen the buffed up heating and plumbing copper pipes running off the Sorn oil-fired stove are an eye-catcher. (Here's a tip from Jill: once the pipes are clean and polished, a rub of Danish Oil ensures a long-lasting shine.)

The Blue School is mostly rendered and white painted, with exposed stone sections as well to show its breeding. Lintels seen in a portion of the stone walls indicate there were plans from the outset to extend the residential portion, but now the most dramatic living spaces are in the lofty school-house portion.

This adaptable and bright large room, divided into dining, living and lounging sections complete with cast iron solid fuel stove, has an overhead study slotted in, with a bridge to a gable-end mezzanine used as a library. Access to this upper deck is via a spiral staircase.

The Blue School is on an acre of grounds, which Jill has transformed.

There's a highly productive organic fruit and veg section, a paddock, a pond currently teeming with frogs, and the whole lot has been enhanced with lots of planting of native tree species (plus fig trees,) low stone borders, beech and willow hedges for pollarding and more a labour of love it clearly is.

The couple have six rescued cats living with them, but if you are feline-phobic don't get in a flap. The cat-flap in the door leads to a long, fenced-in run right along the side of the house that goes under a path bridge and into zoo-like a purpose built cat compound. It seems an extraordinary length to go to, but the cats love it, they are kept safe and the abundant bird wildlife on the doorstep is protected too.

Also part of the great outdoors here is a stone-built stables and stores, with a good deal of storage and workshop space, along with three greenhouses.

There's about 1,800 sq ft of space here, which seems like a lot, and there's loads of individual living space. However, there are only two bedrooms as it is currently laid out, and they are at opposite ends of the house from the single bathroom.

A new owner might want to add a further bedroom or two in the school-house end of the property near the bathroom, and there is room in the main bedroom for an en-suite as well for thems that don't want to go on a winter walkabout for a wee.

Those considerations might seem considerable enough - but the Blue School will get under many buyers' skins and make these quibbles seem irrelevant.