Building on a curve

A BUILDING contracting firm has gone up the learning curve, opting for a contemporary styled crescent shaped project as its first ever development.

“It would have been a shame to waste a site as good as this trying to squeeze in 30 or 40 apartments or box townhouses,” says Mick O’Shea, third generation in the family firm that started off back in 1929 when a family member returned to Ireland Cork after the Wall Street crash.

The company is best known as a general contracting firm, and apart from new buildings has worked on schemes like the conservation of Cork’s Fota House, the re-roofing of St Fin Barre’s Cathedral and the conversion to art gallery of a granary on Cork’s Wandesford Quay.

For its move into development, it took a bold step by deciding to opt for a non-standard scheme, commissioning architect John Morehead of Wain Morehead to come up with a contemporary take on the classic Victorian crescent.

While the inner curve is plain with a coloured render, the exterior curve has brick fins and extensive glazing, and is topped with a monopitch roof.

The site is at Farranlea Road in Cork city’s western suburbs.

The Crescent has 11 three-storey townhouses, each with three bedrooms, and six apartments, in two blocks on a site which is just about to be landscaped.

Density is 17 units to 1.2 acres, greater than the suburban standard but probably low for a site of such value.

The semi-circular design, in two blocks, leaves room for a central garden with one way traffic around it, and the development is set behind low stone walls and electronically controlled gates giving a mix of public and private spaces.

Each town house has a private parking space in front, and individual small rear gardens with patio, while the second floor master bedroom with en suite has a balcony to the rear.

The ground level has a hall, guest loo, and living room/dining room which is generally open plan with a galley kitchen off.

The first floor of these refreshingly original designs has a private living room or optional fourth bedroom, plus bedroom and bathroom, and the top floor has two more bedrooms, one with en suite.

Selling agents are Jackie Cohalan and Malcolm Tyrrell of Cohalan Downing, who have so far released just four units for sale and two of these are reserved. The remaining units are to be made available within weeks as they are completed.

Prices start at €280,000 for two-bed apartments of 750 sq ft with a waiting list already for all six, and the three-storey 1,240 sq ft townhouses range from €375,000 to €390,000, with the end units with larger gardens slightly higher priced. Buyers are likely to be existing house owners in the western suburbs looking to retirement options and trading down from valuable family homes in the Model Farm Road/Bishopstown area.