Amble up Amberley Way

Location: Rochestown, Cork

THERE’S an almost surreal way to locate Amberley Way, from a huge swathe of Cork city’s eastern suburbs. If you look from the low-lying city suburbs, or the northerly hills, towards Rochestown, the singular presence of a tall water tower high on a hill shows the location of this rare property mix — and the reservoir tower sticks up on the hillside like a Google maps or online search locational pin made physical.

It is a fairly modern house name attached to a cluster of old, upgraded original farmyard structures above the crossroads at Rochestown’s Monastery Hill. It is now a hugely attractive lifestyle home mix and income earner for Munster house-hunters on the prowl for something utterly beguiling.

An ancient long, low-slung stone building is now a very comfortable and individual five-bed home, with an adjacent two-bed renovated cottage, all in a courtyard layout with two large, multi-purpose work sheds, ideal for hobbyists or businesses, built behind retained old outbuilding stone walls.

And, this is all on eight acres of grounds including lawns, gardens and shrub beds, huge polytunnel, plus 12 allotments rented to keen gardeners, pasture and yard.

Easy-on-the eye, and full of Good Life promises, it has been home to landscape gardener Brian Ludgate and his wife Sue, who with their three children all in their 30s, are ready to downsize. They’ve been here, in evident bliss, for over 30 years, says Brian — and will find it hard to leave, admits Sue.

It comes to market on their behalf with Sam Kingston of Casey and Kingston, who points to its relative rarity: an historic property made into a large and individual family home, grounds, guest cottage and buildings, in a elevated setting with views east and west along the Lee valley and harbour — and practically no distance from the city, services, schools, suburbs and within a few minutes of the ring road and Lee tunnel too.

Price guide is €795,000, so that narrows the buying spread a bit. But, because of all of its extras, this is a homestead that can work for a living and help pay its way if it has to. The two 1,500 sq ft modern sheds used by Brian are secure, dry, with roller shutter doors and could accommodate a range of businesses, or a collectionsobsessed hobbyist, vintage cars, boats, or be adapted as stables for ponies.

The two-bed cottage is in very good order, and can bring rental income; a broadband mast alone earns €1,200 pa, thanks to the land’s elevation and sweep of sight lines, and the 12 allotments each bring in €300 a year, held on annual licenses only.

When the Ludgates bought, back in the early 1980s, Amberley Way was already converted to residential usage, and they continued to improve and invest, bit by bit, keeping faith with its low, slate roofed lines.

Brian Ludgate managed to salvage very old pine shutters from the former Britfieldstown House by Minane, associated with the Roberts family, and they give a lovely antique feel to this home, used as shutters, wall panels and even doors.

Amberley Way has kept much of its own old timbers too, such as the stout roof beams, visible in a couple of upstairs bedrooms and a very large first floor lounge, whose Veluxes open up long Cork valley vistas.

It all wears its age well: there’s exposed stone inside and out in thick walls, and feature timbers, but double glazing is modern, there’s a well-positioned Wessex conservatory, a recently fitted modern bathroom, and a bright, double-aspect fresh kitchen with simple units. The kitchen has great views into the courtyard through a wide, arched window likely to have hosted coach-house doors in an earlier existence.

The house has three of its five bedrooms downstairs, reception rooms both upstairs and down, dual heating, and good circulation space, with utility, and easy access to — what else? — a well-tended garden.

VERDICT: Where home and history rhyme.