Wooden it be nice ...

THE outside might look like a conventional, albeit upmarket dormer bungalow — but the delight is in the detail. Built for his own ends by craftsman joiner John Desmond, Ballady Lodge, on its acre site, near Belgooly, in Co Cork, is a place where you can see the woods, and the trees.

Native ash and whitethorn border this rural, brick-and-stone faced, detached five-bed home, on the Kinsale side of the Cork-Kinsale road.

The house has 3,000 sq ft of space, plus a lofty, detached garage with 800 sq ft of ground-floor space, and 600 sq ft overhead to the rear of the main house.

Timbers used include reclaimed, pine floor boards from the US; there’s an eye-catching, herringbone pattern in the hall, and repeated on the back of the stair flight, with ash cupboards underneath, and the kitchen has units in maple. The real scene-stealer is the five-sided gable sun-room, with its ceiling clad in narrow-strip cedar, matched by a low wall, also cedar-clad: it’s good to see a beautiful wood-grain exposed again. The modern home, with three reception rooms, five bedrooms — three of them en-suite — plus two standalone bathrooms, is priced at €600,000, via joint agents, Keane Mahony Smith’s Kinsale, and Sheehy Brothers.

Last month marked a year of the agencies shared listings, viewings and client lists. The link-up has worked for them and for vendors, with seven successful sales (one in Belgooly broadly similar to this offering above, on two acres), five more are ‘sale agreed,’ and a couple of others houses under offer.