Could this former schoolhouse become one of West Cork’s most coveted coastal homes?

With planning permission for a major transformation, the 1880s building sits beside one of West Cork’s most popular beaches

The Old School House,  Old Head of Kinsale, Cork. Pics: Media Pro Cork

Old Head of Kinsale, Cork
€495,000
Size	262 sq m (2,810 sq ft)
Bedrooms	4
Bathrooms	3
BER	G

Proximity to the Old Head of Kinsale Golf Course and having a long, sandy beach right on its doorstep, are just two of the drivers behind the instant international interest in this rare-set slice of Ireland’s educational and social history.

New to the open market with a price tag just shy of €500,000 is the c 1880s stone-built Old Schoolhouse by a pedestrian pathway to Garrylucas beach: it’s one of the two wave-swept beaches at Kinsale’s Garrets-town south west of Kinsale, also known as White Strand.

Already, calls have started flooding in from the far side of the Atlantic, as well as closer to home, says Trevor O’Sullivan of Lisney Sotheby’s International Realty.

Noting it was set up under the so-called 1831 ‘Stanley Letter’ for non-religious denominational national schools, the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage dates the Lispatrick Lower/Old Head school to the 1880s and singles out its brick and rubble stone construction with its carved stone plaque denoting it as ‘Old Head of Kinsale National School,’ placed between the separate boys’ and girls’ classroom entrances.

Likely to have been built a century and a half ago at a cost of £500, the school would have served a wide Old Head catchment for children of farmers and fishermen in the main.

Today, the Old Head of Kinsale Golf Course (where a round of golf alone is €500 in high season) is probably the area’s most substantial employer, including of some local children and past pupils as extremely well-tipped caddies, with ‘gratuities’ coming on top of caddy rates of €80 to €90 a bag.

School days here by the beach ended decades ago, with Ballinspittle now picking up the educational slack 4km away, and this former national school with separate section for boys and girls swung around to private residential use, and got a series of basic single storey additions to the back also in the past to bring it up to a current floor area of over 2,800 sq ft.

Planning permission was approved in September of this year for significant, architect-driven alterations and upgrades, but also to slightly reduce the size to 2,600 sq ft (according to Lisney SIR), and which includes a zinc-clad or pressed metal box dormer bedroom with glazed balcony for beach and ocean views.

The Old Schoolhouse is on a site of 0.26 of an acre just off the N604 road, where the smaller former schoolmaster’s residence fronts the road, and adjacent is a public car park for pedestrian beach access to Garrylucas beach/White Strand.

Design for the alterations is by Cork architect Louise Sliney, who also did design work for US billionaire James Berwind at his first Kinsale purchase, the €4.75m Georgian gem Sprayfield House at Sandycove … before he all but fully and controversially demolished it. Among Mr Berwind’s €20m-plus Kinsale buying splurge of multi-million euro houses was a farm outside Ballinspittle, reportedly to provide fodder for his animal rescue intentions.

The Price Register records The Old Schoolhouse at Lispatrick Lower selling by November 2025 over two different prices, one at €440,000 and also at €110,000, with the application made by a Ben O’Leary.

Planning was sought in May of 2026, approved by September despite third part objections concerning overlooking from the HSE and from the charity Corlann (previously Brothers of Charity) who operate a regional respite facility adjacent for adults with additional needs.

In granting permission for the changes in an acknowledged sensitive coastal site, Cork County Council planners determined “the proposed development would not seriously injure the amenities of adjoining property or of the area and would be adequately sympathetic to the host structure on National Inventory of Architectural Heritage in accordance with the proper planning and sustainable development of the area”.

Auctioneer Trevor O’Sullivan says what’s now on open offer as a resale with full planning permission secured (CGI images, opposite) gives “an exceptional opportunity to acquire a prime coastal site in one of West Cork’s most desirable and picturesque locations.”, adding it’s a chance “to create a bespoke coastal home in a truly spectacular setting, where natural beauty, tranquility, and an enviable lifestyle come together”.

It’s a minute’s barefoot amble to the eastern end of Garrylucas beach, which is popular with kite surfers while Garretstown Beach also hosts surfers and sea swimmers, and both strands have regular barrel sauna set-ups, including the Sauna Snugg at Garrylucas’ dunes.

The Old Head pier by sheltered Bullen bay is just to the east of Garrylucas, near the family-run Speckled Door bar/seafood restaurant, with a c 6km loop walk out to the high-cliff top set Old Head of Kinsale Golf Course (no public access) and the Lusitania Museum, in a restored former Napoleonic signal tower, recalling the fated ship’s sinking in 1915 eight miles off the Old Head.

The Price Register shows only a handful of Lispatrick house sales, the most recent and largest being a bungalow nearby, one of several in a row on the N604 in May of this year at €551,000.

The Speckled Door bar

VERDICT: Despite not having a private site, there’s a very good chance the Old Schoolhouse may end up going to the top of the class pricewise given the level of initial interest, whilst rebuild costs may push this well into a €1m-plus overall spendclass of its own.

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