A church for conversion

Tommy Barker views an old church that has recently found other uses.

IT’S Halloween this weekend, but you won’t find things going bump in the night, or by day, at Kiloveenoge church in West Cork.

“From the first moment we walked in here 16 years ago we felt an entirely benevolent energy, something very positive from it, there is nothing at all spooky about here, and it has always been a happy place,” says Swiss-born Thomas Kay. He’s an artist, architect, dancer and generally creative individual who, along with his partner, has had this church as their base since the 1980s.

He and his partner Lisa Noel, also an artist and a healer, have used this former church as a work space primarily (they call it the Centre for Art and Healing) but also have lived here at times since 1988. It features their art work, furniture and even some dramatic Greek drama masks a tragic figure and a faun feature here in these pictures.

It is roadside, has gas heating and local site services. While it is mostly open plan, it has a kitchen, shower room, and gallery space reached with a spiral stairs.

Kiloveenoge is a former chapel of ease for the local Durrus Church of Ireland parish, which means it was a secondary chapel, used for simple ceremonies and there’s no attached cemetery - so probably few if any funerals were held here. There’s a slough of people who just won’t live in a church conversion, apparently, and the fact of bodies laid out overnight for funerals is often expressed as the main reason.

The church is on half an acre of grounds, in close proximity to the sea, and there a pier and moorings just a half a mile away.

“The land going with the church has lots of character, with old ruins and different levels, corners, niches and old and new trees,” says Mr Kay.

The translation of the place name is kil na bhan óige, meaning the church of the young women, and the site’s use dates back to the 8th century when there was a priory here, with St Canera as a possible prioress. The site was ransacked by Vikings in AD890, and the ruins have been in slow decline since.

This chapel was built in 1866, to serve English lead miners working on the peninsula, and it was deconsecrated in the 1980s.

Thomas and Lisa substantially renovated the building, which is now in good overall shape with a fine timber beamed ceiling and hefty corbels, and have also got planning permission (since 2000, so time is running out) for a studio/office 100’ away on the site to the north, separated from it by the ruined cottage of a Captain O’Donovan. The main open chapel space is 46’ by 19’, with high pitched ceilings.

Charles McCarthy estate agent in Skibbereen seeks around €600,000 for the church, suitable for residential or commercial/tourist uses, and after being on the market since the summer, it is ‘open to offers.’