Something to chew on

Woodcock Grove, associated with toffee makers Cleeves, has been switched to self-catering cottages, writes Tommy Barker.

THERE’S a world of difference between the two Dundrums, one in Dublin, the other a long way away in Tipperary. The former is now best-known as a sprawling mega shopping centre in the midst of Dublin’s southside, crawling with Ugg-booted teenagers and Yummy Mummies, while the latter’s more real, rooted, and historic, with a creamy and creamery past.

Signs point off the M8 Cork-Dublin motorway to Dundrum village just over the Cork-Tipperary border. And it’s already well-known for the conversion of the 1730s Georgian manor house to a country hotel, wedding venue, leisure centre with 21m pool, and a 18-hole golf course designed by Philip Watson. While the country house hotel has its own self-catering accommodation, there’s another option, right on the boundary of the golf course.

Local man John Browne enthusiastically oversaw the conversion of a former creamery building on lovely wooded grounds to seven self-catering cottages, now up for sale with agents Savills in Cork and Dublin, with an existing income stream, guiding €1.5/€1.7 million.

The mix includes 15 acres with romantic woodland walks, a rope bridge over a stream, a tennis court, lots of parking, and an acre suitable as a site for a single, detached new house — subject to planning.

Offered in one lot, it’s most likely going to have an appeal to someone who wants a ready-made tourism product, or another rental venture that’s pretty manageable, and it has a steady income stream already from longer-term lets, to local professionals and those working in Dundrum and other Tipperary towns, who want a bit of quality to their living environment, says Sam Daunt of Savills.

It’s earning between €45,000 and €60,000 a year, with about 80% occupancy at present, so hard-nosed investors might need to see a way of getting more return to justify the sort of asking price being sought, but which is open, say Savills, to negotiation.

The property, called Woodcock Grove, is limestone and brick-faced and was built as a creamery in the 1800s by the Cleeves family to provide milk for their confectionery products. The family scion, Thomas Henry Cleeve, moved to Limerick in the 1860s and saw huge scope for dairy products from Munster and the Golden Vale. Along with his brothers, he built up a dairy empire including condensed milk, rising to 60,000 cans a day with up to 1,000 workers by the early 1900s, with much of the product exported to the far corners of the British Empire. More recent generations will remember Cleeves slab toffee, now back in production since 2008 with LC Confectionery, who’ve also revived the Hadj Bey Turkish Delight brand. (As well as retro-brands, they’ve a chocolate two-fingered offering, the Jedward Popping Chocolate Twin Bars, plus a hair-raising Jedward Easter egg!)

Back at this old slice of Cleeve history, this creamery building was taken over by Tipperary Co-Operative Society, serving as the local depot for outlying dairy farmers until the 1980s.

It was refurbished and wholly redeveloped in 2004, made over to a terrace of seven high-end two and three bedroomed townhouses, with Goppa brand fireplaces and electric heating. Sizes range from one small 620sq ft unit to larger ones, averaging 800sq ft, with quality interiors and character, with open plan ground floor layouts and sympathetic timber windows.

Dundrum village is short drive away, Cashel is seven miles away, Cork’s 75 minutes away, Limerick’s 45 minutes and Thurles rail station is a 15 minute drive. The sale includes two life-time memberships to Dundrum Golf Club.

VERDICT: A quality job, if the lifestyle suits.