Retro look could pay off for house sale in high-end estate

IF imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Cork’s Lindville houses have been flattered to the eyeballs.

Built from the late 1990s and finished out in the early 2000s, the scheme of more than 60 faux-Victorian homes on the site of a former private hospital in Cork’s Blackrock/Ballintemple suburb spawned a host of copies around Cork city, county and even further afield.

Original architect Roderick Hogan carefully detailed Lindville house design and proportion, getting it far more right than most of his imitators since, knowing that things like roof pitch, authentic materials, window shape and hefty, ornate timber fascias were the key to getting the ‘retro’ look right.