Sunday’s Well gem has seen state’s foundation ... and more

A stunning garden is the jewel in this restored gem, says Tommy Barker.

IT is just five years since No 57 Sunday’s Well – a house with a bit of old Republican and Civil War history links – last went up for sale.

Back in May 2004, this house, with over 80 metres of rear garden down to the bank of the River Lee, was priced in the €600,000s, and needed work.

Now, the work has all been done, it is even more charming than ever, the market has risen and fallen in the meantime, and the asking price is back at the mid-€600,000 level.

It has a great location, right opposite Fitzgerald Park and the Mardyke, with a full-on southerly aspect, and a colourful garden with high stone walls, creating a virtual micro-climate for its planting.

The location, in old Sunday’s Well, is highly prized, especially for those houses whose gardens go right down to the river – as they do in this case.

Cork’s most expensive house sale was along this line of privileged, Grand Circle seats, making about €6 million in an off-market boom times deal, while more run-of-the-mill big houses here are still firmly in the €1 million to €2m price category, depending on condition.

Consultants and lawyers, and the wealthier business types tend to tend up with the bigger buys, while UCC academics bring up the rear-guard in the bidding stakes for the lower and mid-level rare residential offerings.

The vendors of No 57 are UCC-based, and moved here for sheer convenience with a family of three, two of whom are now on the point of flying the nest, hence the prospect of the parents seeking to trade down locally.

Estate agent Michael O’Donovan of Sherry FitzGerald has the sale, and he guides the immaculate four-bed, three-storey, 1850s home at €650,000. He’d better stand by for viewings – there’ll be plenty of interest, and they can’t be hurried. By the time you get to the bottom of the slalom-like 80 metre garden to the water’s edge, and back up again, time will have pleasantly idled by, and that’s not even allowing for wandering through the house and its levels.

Entry to this 1,600sq ft retreat is at street level, opposite the junction to Shanakiel, and previous owners passed on the story of how one of the sentries who stood guard over the body of the assassinated Michael Collins which lay in Shankiel Hospital spent the night in No 57.

Three terrazzo steps lead up to the glazed front door, with an oval porthole window alongside novel architectural features, and among the many retained features of this house are the coloured, stained and leaded glazed doors, some a rich cobalt blue (think Milk of Magnesia bottles).

Floors in and around the halls are neatly tiled with small feature blue glazed tiles, steps are trimmed with brass rods, while other rooms have old, carefully kept and polished floorboards. Fireplaces are all period (including one or two bedroom pieces), some with glazed tile inserts and cast-iron surrounds.

The top floor has three bedrooms and a smart newly fitted bathroom, the middle level has a bedroom, bathroom and good reception room, while the lower level has modern galley kitchen/dining room with raised breakfast bistro-style seating space, and there’s also a lower level dining/family room, with new bay window and French doors to the deck and patio beyond.

There’s about 1,600sq ft of space here, all of it pristinely presented: for those who want more, there’s surely the option to extend at lower level, and perhaps have a roof balcony too off the mid-level living room.

The views out (which include UCC, the park, and County Hall) are soothing, all greenery and seasonal colour, and as all the neighbours in the row appreciate and tend their gardens, each benefit from views over the others’ planting.

The garden at No 57 is on the narrower end of the scale, about 30’ wide, but it seems to go on forever, nicely broken up into sections near the house, with retaining sleepers. There’s a very old characterful corrugated steel shed/greenhouse, and a sheltered decked dining area, with rambling roses and climbers in abundance.

The gardens are now in coming into full bloom, with azaleas, camellias, rhododendron, lilies, bear’s paw, palms, hazel, bluebells, bay trees, cypresses, and whole host, a real mix of recent planting and old favourites which keep coming through.

High sandstone walls on either side run both sides of the full length of garden, with a secure railing and gate keeping safe access to the river, and with the Shaky Bridge just to the west. Previous owners kept their own rods for salmon fishing here.

No 57 is no mean catch itself.