Hosanna in the highest bid: Cork church goes sale agreed at €400k

A deal has been reached with a religious body to purchase the Sundays Well landmark building for more than €400,000 

St Vincent's Church, Sundays Well, Cork.

St Vincent’s Church in Sundays Well, on Cork city’s northern hills, has gone sale agreed for more than €400,000 after a deal was reached with another religious body to purchase it.

The Catholic Church, historically linked to the Vincentian Fathers, was the subject of a bidding war, with four religious bodies involved in the process at one point.

The purchasers have so far declined to publicise their name as the congregation has not yet been informed. However the Irish Examiner understands it is a Christian Church organisation with a long-established existing base in Cork city.

St Vincent's Church, Sunday's Well

Interested parties when the premises first came up for sale in 2018 included evangelical Christian groups as well as the Orthodox Church.

The speed at which the landmark sandstone building went sale agreed is in sharp contrast to a protracted engagement with University College Cork (UCC) — reported as the buyer of the Gothic-style premises in 2019.

As previously reported in this newspaper, UCC withdrew from the sale process last May. The college declined to comment at the time. UCC has owned the adjacent seminary building since 1999, which is home to UCC Department of Music.

Within a month of the 12,000 sq ft premises returning to market in September, agents Lisney had logged “about 50 enquiries” and had carried out 40 viewings. No offers were received from developers or alternative purpose users. Lisney agent Ger O’Callaghan said while they “saw value in the property, a lot of clients were concerned about getting permission for change of use and conditions that might attach”.

Included in the sale is a large hall at lower ground level, previously used as a community centre, as well as a car park with 18 spaces, where a revenue split agreement is in place with the car park operator.

It’s been a decade since Mass was last celebrated at the church, a protected structure built in the 1850s and extended in the 1880s.

It has some magnificent features, including painted Stations of the Cross by Le Dien school in Normandy; a caen stone and marble pulpit, carved by Henry Lane in 1861 and magnificent stained-glass windows by the likes of Mayer & Co of Munich and William Wailes of Newcastle-on-Tyne.

Picture: Jim Coughlan

Picture: Jim Coughlan

An organ consisting of 36 stops and over 2,000 pipes, installed by Telford’s of Dublin, is in need of repair. 

Notable architects involved included John Benson, who designed the church, with later work done by ecclesiastical architect and designer George Goldie, who fitted out the sanctuary, and Samuel E Hynes, who completed the façade in the mid-1880s when the church was extended to the west.

The property is being sold with the artifacts in place and it will be for the buyer to deal with on completion.

St Vincent's Church and Presbytery c.1906

A view of St. Vincent's church, Sunday's Well, Cork 3/6/1927 

The property first came to market in 2018 along with a separate 1.1a (0.45ha) site once used as the Blue Demons basketball court and club house, at a substantial drop below Sunday’s Well Road. At the time, both church and site had a combined €1.5m price guide, or €750,000 per individual lot.

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