Video: Sherwood is a class apart

Movie stars, sporting heroes and racing capers just part of this house’s history writes Tommy Barker.

THERE’S quite the long line of one family’s history to the land and property here, Sherwood, a 1980s luxury home with longer roots, as it comes for a spring 2018 sale.

Built back in 1983, it’s a family detached home, off Cork’s South Douglas Road looking particularly well for a 35-year old build, and has been utterly at home with itself on a secluded grounds, with its near gardens designed by the late Brian Cross.

It got built by the Powell family on the site of an old, low dormer-style home on a couple of productive garden acres by the screened period home Ballincurrig House. The Powells are direct descendants of Michael Collins, and the original old house and land which was owned by an aunt Brenda was bought by other, related Powell family members, at a public auction, to guarantee transparency for other beneficiaries of that ’80s era estate sale.

The full two acres yielded several separate new builds to repay some of the then-considerable outlay, and then the one-off Sherwood remained on an acre just to the east, entered via electric gates and a curving drive for privacy.

It’s now downsizing time, and as Sherwood comes to the market it’s being offered on a still-reasonable one-third acre.

Its vendor has secured planning permission for two contemporary builds in a lower section of its grounds, previously much used as a soccer and rugby pitch for sons and friends and visitors... including one Ronan O’Gara, back in more distant schoolboy days.

Oh, and not only is this where the likes of Ronan O’Gara hung out, another habitue was Douglas/Ballintemple-born actor Cillian Murphy, who jammed, played jazz guitar and sang in Sherwood’s teenagers’ den room, back in his band membership days, when he shared a gigging platform with one John Powell.

One of the new-builds shortly set for construction on a lower portion of Sherwood’s land is for trader-down matriarch Claire Powell, and alongside is a larger home for the same son John, – who’ll be continuing thus to sport and play at this familiar stomping ground.

Though simple outlines, and set to be built behind rear stone wall, both are designed by the highly regarded Kiosk Architects, and will have their entrance in via a cul de sac section of the Glencurrig estate to the south.

Continuing the family link as Sherwood is about to be sold is the appointment the selling agent: it’s Michael Powell of Powell Property and, yes, there’s a connection: he’s selling his childhood and teenage years’ home. No pressure at all, so.

He guides Sherwood at €795,000 and says it has been lovingly cared for by its current owner... eh, his mother.

Well, he’d have to, in any case, but in this instance it’s an easy claim to stand over, as Mrs Powell is clearly into home and decors: in fact, she works as colour consultant with the thankfully reinstated Hickeys on Maylor Street and Oliver Plunkett Street in the city centre. (Hickeys, nearly the last of the ‘needle to an anchor’ outlets left in the city centre, and has grown back to new strengths, thanks to things like designer favourites’ ranges like Little Green paints and selections of papers.)

No surprise, so, to find touches like a hand painted kitchen, and a hearty navy Aga, at the heart of Sherwood, and an otherwise pristine range of redecorated rooms over two levels.

The bulk of the living space right now at the 2,560 sq ft Sherwood is at ground level, about on a one-third/two-thirds split and includes an entry portico, wide foyer with oak flooring, corniced ceilings and a mahogany stairs, plus three reception rooms, kitchen/diner, utility and playroom/games room....the aforementioned teenage party room, with some fairly talented ‘guests.’

It’s all been traditionally built and entirely faced in brick, and is approached from the rear/north aspect, with a full sweep of south facing rooms and patio and garden access to the south, with a mix of bay windows and sliding patio doors.

The three reception rooms, to the west/mid section, are currently individual and quality spaces, such as the formal dining and the traditional drawing room with large white marble fireplace, but are only divided by a stud wall, and so could be joined into one c 400 sq ft room quite easily by new owners who might want the more open plan/dual aspect approach in the main reception.

Already, the kitchen/dining room at Sherwood is double aspect, and about 300 sq ft, with painted units, island, ceiling beams, tiled floor and dining section, with garden views and access to a Liscannor-flagged sun-trap patio. It’s been a good, casual entertaining space, and was set off by the addition of the dark blue Aga about ten years ago, set into a brick and tile surround.

A glazed, single door leads from the dining end of the good-sized kitchen to a super-bright family rooms, wood floored, with open fireplace and south-aspected bay windows, while on the other side of the kitchen is a more practical utility/boot room and the games room, also with a fireplace and external access, in a single storey annexe.

It’s all a very workable layout, yet easily adapted and the cork-tiled games room could readily adapt to other, new uses, such as a ground floor bedroom.

As it stands, though, it need nothing done so any change will be personal and/or lifestyle dictated. It’s all easily maintained too, with all-brick walls, slate roof and double glazing, while heating is oil fired, and the BER’s a solid-enough D2.

The grounds are mature on approach and surround, with mature beech trees by the boundary to Ballincurrig House, and new beeches are planted to continue the theme, while there’s also a lovely myrtle with orange-red bark by the tarmac drive and parking areas.

Garden designer Brian Cross suggested some raised shrub beds, done in Ballydesmond stone, and there’s year-round colour in the planting, and side lawn boundary screening from other properties now built to the west of this quarter acre plot.

As it’s set off the road, down a shared private approach and then past electric gates and red pillars, not too many people will know of the existence of Sherwood. Close by, another detached at the top of Greenhills has just had significant upgrades, as did another at the bottom of Rosebank, and both were mid 1900s-built homes.

A key attraction of the settled suburban location is accessibility, half way between the city and Douglas village, within a walk of both, with access point too to the south city ring and link road networks even closer to hand.

And, almost on the doorstep of Sherwood is an almost completed development of former stables and yard, sold back in 2014, and now providing about a dozen stylish, architect-enhanced townhouses, set behind relocated ornate cast iron gate and pillars.

Those stables were once owned by Cork’s legendary entrepreneur, and one-time 1960s/70s era builder millionaires, the flamboyant and cigar-chomping Tony Murphy, known for driving around a fairly undeveloped Cork in a gold Rolls Royce.

Tony Murphy had built a house here with swimming pool (since demolished) and is recalled still for his ingenious 1974 UK betting coup and sting on bookies with a horse Gay Future, who had been stabled for a while, here on the South Douglas Road next to what’s now Sherwood.

A local syndicate, the Crock of Gold, got more satisfaction than gains after a number of bookies didn’t pay out on Gay Future’s well-planned win, and the daring story garnered furlongs of newsprint coverage both side of the Irish Sea, as well as a book, and a film starring Pierce Brosnan... the Cillian Murphy of the day.

VERDICT: smashing house, and a smattering of recent history, all rolled into one.

South Douglas Road, Cork

€795,000

Size: 239 sq m (2,560 sq ft)

Bedrooms: 4

Bathrooms: 4

BER: D2

Pictures: Ted Murphy