Lording over Leeside

LOTA Ville House, a large late Georgian home on the hills fringing the eastern outskirts of Cork city and overlooking the Lee, is up for sale.

A family home for the past four decades, it has 7,500 sq ft of space over three levels - but that excludes the rounded floor area of the three storey round tower folly built on its north eastern corner.

Set on three acres of totally private grounds, the property is within three miles of Cork city - up in the wooded hills beyond the Moran Silversprings Hotel and Flemings restaurant.

The sale, through joint agents Irish and European and Ganly Walters, includes a two-bed gate lodge and a one-bed granny flat, while the grounds include a profusion of mature trees and shrubs, including magnolia, oak, pines, copper beech, rhododendrons and laurel.

Guide price is €1.6 million, and Lota Ville has scope for both continued private residential usage (it was home to the Whelan family, with six children) or may be put to commercial ends.

It is two-storey over basement property, and unusually the entire basement area has been made a functioning space, with games rooms, bar, sauna and shower room, offices, dens, stores and other accommodation which is virtually wholly self-contained. It has replacement windows fitted at this lower level, and has central heating, but a new owner is likely to brighten it up as at present it has lots of dark wood finishes.

While appearing quite sound, it will take further spending on modernisation: there’s a surfeit of parana pine decoration in some rooms dating back to its last 1970s overhaul, but the original fabirc has not been damaged.

The main house has six bedrooms and three fine reception rooms, with the reception rooms all to the front and south-facing part of the house, while a kitchen, pantry and smaller service room plus study with tall bay window are to the rear. A central hallway runs through the house from the front door and inner hall through the main hall and functional galley kitchen, terminating perhaps after a 80 to 100’ run with a fine set of French doors to a patio area off the kitchen. Two of the reception rooms are interconnecting, and have fine original white marble fireplaces with brass surrounds, club fenders, and are graced with some appropriately grand antiques and decorative items.

All the reception rooms have ornate plasterwork and ceiling roses.

Much of the original architectural features remain well preserved: the windows at ground and first floor are all wooden sash with intact shutters. While some windows have the old and original glass, others have had double glazing which upsets the lines of the glazing bars - a slight aesthetic trade perhaps for comfort.

Several bedrooms are bright doubles, there are several bathrooms, and the master bedroom really deserves the title, measuring about 25’ square with south and east aspect, it has a large dressing room off with arched window with some coloured glazing, full-sized bathroom with bath and shower, and there is access from the dressing room to the upper floors of the slender round tower.

The grounds include a tennis court, meandering paths, greenhouse with vine and numerous quiet seating areas.