American touch to home with water views

Tommy Barker discovers a logical flow to the layout of this carefully designed house.

THERE’S a strong feel of the much-copied, airy American “great room” about Woodhaven – and little wonder, as one of its owners is from Washington DC.

This cracking-sized, single-storey house up above Raffeen Creek at Strawhill, near Monkstown in Cork harbour picks up on the US style of high-ceilinged big family rooms. And, it delivers them in the colourful kitchen/dining/family room, with vaulted ceilings, and again on an even loftier scale in the more formal split-level living room with a dry-bar hidden in a closet to the side of the completely formal dining room. Oh, that dining room has done sit-down dinners for 16 guests, by the way.