Detached home is out of this world

A HOUSE with an Around the World touch about its building materials has been brought closer to Cork city thanks to the new Ballincollig by-pass.

Finely pitched at the start of the summer selling season is this Currahely, Farran home, a few miles west of Cork on the Macroom/Kerry and Killarney road.

Built in the late 1990s, it is a big dormer home high on a south-facing hillside, and is a place finished out with a modern twist.

It is well up on the hilly ridge north of the N22, which opens up views that literally stretch for miles. And miles.

Kilcrea Abbey is due south on the fertile prosperous plains, and the house’s central core has been opened up to frame the views.

The centre-section is a double height entrance hall/atrium, perhaps 20’ or more to the apex and it does its light-flooding job extremely well.

In all, there’s nearly 2,500 sq ft of living space here, and the brightness is attested to by the healthy coil of large house plants happily at home in the hall, kitchen and living areas.

On the market with Norma Healy and Sheila O’Flynn of Sherry FitzGerald, this pad on a sloping half acre site carries a price guide of €750,000, and has the signs of recent and expensive landscaping.

“There’s hardly been any trading up houses west of Ballincollig around Farran in the last year or so, so there’ll be lots of interest in this quality arrival,” predicts Sheila O’Flynn.

Materials used include West Cork stone for the front (a planning stipulation), Spanish brick inside in the living and kitchen, marble floors in the hall and a Swiss-styled chrome handrail on the open-tread stairs, along with Canadian yellow pine used elsewhere for floors. The lounge has a stone fireplace and patio access to south-west, there’s a family room, again with a stone fireplace, Spanish brick arch to the kitchen/dining room with ash units, a Belfast sink and maple floor.

One of the five bedrooms (or four plus optional study with ISDN lines) has an ensuite with power shower, and the main bathroom is a soaking spot with a Jacuzzi bath.

The house is cut into its sloping site, is set below the approach road with a good parking apron and patio around it and there’s a detached garage as well built to a high standard with pitched roof and home-office potential.