Cosy family feel to a large modern Watergrasshill home
explores a lovely expansive home sitting pretty on five acres of land, yet just minutes’ walk from elevated Watergrasshill.
DESPITE its relatively large size, there’s quite the warm, hospitable family home vibe to Tinegeragh: that’s best exemplified in the kitchen, with the presence of a reconditioned old, pale blue Aga stove at its core, and the welcoming bark of a well-fed and oversized Corgi dog.
That immediate sense of being made to feel at home is reinforced upon hearing it’s been the family home of stalwarts of the local Watergrasshill community, Peggy O’Mahony, a teacher of renown, and of her late husband John O’, who relished his role as the man behind the counter at the local O’Mahony’s bar.
That bar business, with 200 years of hospitality to its credit, had been through three generations of family ownership, traditionally being passed down to the women in the family.
And, that tradition is continuing, as after John O’s passing several years ago: the bar and funked up foodie business is now being run by John O’ and Peggy’s daughter Máire, with her partner Victor Murphy, who forged quite the stellar reputation for himself when he set up House Cafe in Cork city’s Opera House. Victor and Máire are now full-time in the bar/restaurant/venue — see www. omahonysofwatergrasshill.com.
Its future seems assured as it has a whole new energy, in tune with massive growth in population of Watergrasshill, since the early 2000s.
Evidence of the deep-rooted connection was the recent arrival of a TG4 crew to Tinegeragh, for a food special, when Victor Murphy, and the O’Mahony clan, rolled back the clock from his proven culinary ability at tapas and fresh local artisan produce, to more traditional staples like stuffed hearts and lungs, cooked in this kitchen’s hard-working blue Aga.
This home, set about 1km from the bar and main street at Watergrasshill, was built back in 2005 by John O’ and Peggy, even as their own family reached adulthood. At 4,600 sq ft within, and set on five acres without, it’s always been the focus of family gatherings, big meals, and inter-generational banter: three generations at the least, whilst a portrait of a mischievous-looking older woman looks knowingly down on the dining table, painted by Crawford Art College graduate (and bar owner) Máire, of her grandmother, keeping faith with another, fourth generation.
But, now, it’s downsize time, says Peggy rather wistfully of her home Tinegeragh (house of the shepherd) — the house also went under the name of The Quarries, as land adjacent is home to several slate quarries, with many houses on Cork’s Dublin Hill behatted under Watergrasshill slate, she observes.
But, the expectation that the small lake (or large pond) just inside the electric access gates to Tinegeragh may have been a quarry pit is quickly disabused: it’s fed, she says, by springs from the nearby Kiln Hill, and flows in and out of their land here.
The couple owned a c 40 acre farm here (Tinegeragh is offered on five acres, but anyone who wants the true country lifestyle package here can buy more land if they wish), and they got the traditional block-built large home after input from architect John O’Connell of Blarney’s Coolowen and the input of builder Pat O’Regan, of Killavullen.
And, while it looks traditional-enough and comfortably at home in its utterly private site, with rendered walls, sliding sash windows and, unexpectedly, slate roof (and many old, country pine antiques and settles inside, for good measure), it — surprisingly enough — has geothermal heating. This is supplied as under-floor heating, with tiled floors in the main, both upstairs and down, almost uniformly under large-sized pale tiles. The heating is extremely effective, says vendor Peggy.
With 4,600 sq ft on offer, there’s no stinting on space, and really, there’s no small or mean rooms either, and the entry hall, stairs and landing are all on the very generous end of the scale.
It has three principal reception rooms, several with large open fireplaces, and one has an ornate antique stove. Plus, there are a couple of unusual end-gable alcoves, one described as a garden or sun room, a very big utility/back hall, pantry, and two ground-floor WCs plus store/bedroom five. Overhead are four more bedrooms, three of them en-suite, plus a main family bathroom, several with views out towards the Galtees.
Oh, and that’s not overlooking the home’s true heart, the T-shaped kitchen, with painted hand-built timber units, in an array of sections and functions, the Aga, and a high-ceilinged double-aspect dining area and sun-room, with overhead Veluxes, huge display dresser, and a multi-fuel stove, next to the previously mentioned affectionate portrait of an earlier family matriarch.
It all gets an impressive B3 Building Energy Rating, and now it’s up for new family owner to colonise.
Joint selling agents are Michael O’Donovan jnr of Sherry FitzGerald O’Donovan in Fermoy, acting jointly with Malcolm Tyrrell of Cohalan Downing, based in Cork city.
The choice of two slightly geographically diverse agents is perhaps apt, as a buyer could come from an existing home in the county, as readily as from the city, and
it’s only a 10-minute drive up the M8 from the suburban fringes by Glanmire.
Tinegeragh’s guided at €575,000, and there’s not a lot on offer county-wise, with so many of the attributes (build quality, size, with extensive planting and pond, shed/garage/outbuildings, as well as five private acres and the option of more land), for a buyer who wants space in the countryside, and yet be so accessible to services.
Vendor Peggy says she and John O’ campaigned long and hard back in the late 1990s and early 2000s to have the M8 pass as close as possible to Watergrasshill when it was bypassed back in 2003 so it didn’t suffer isolation. And, indeed, the M8’s junction 17 is a short burst from motorway to main street, while Tinegeragh is a minute’s spin by car on the other side of Watergrasshill.
The village has now rapidly grown in terms of population (it’s over 1,300 in the 2016 census) with a new school, an active First Fruits Arts Centre in the former Church of Ireland building, and the presence of a certain, updated O’Mahony’s Bar.
A well-rooted, rural home with assured comfort.
€575,000
428 sq m (4,600 sq ft) on five acres
4/5
6
B3
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