Interior designer adds glamour to €340,000 Grange home
105 sq m/1130 sq ft
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WITH a reputation for head-turning design (she previously took the honours for Most Stylish Hat at the Killarney Races) Agne Kremenskiene’s detached Grange Park home is not your average family pad.
Since the interior designer bought Avoca 1A in January 2016 for €210,000, she has applied a very clear vision to transform relatively modest accommodation into what could easily be a showhouse.
When Ms Kremenskiene bought Avoca four years ago as a small family home, she had viewed lots of properties around Cork, “but nothing stood out”.
“The minute I saw this house on the market, I fell in love with the ground-floor open space and back garden. Straight away, I had a vision of how it should look as a dream home,” she says.
The entire ground floor — guest bathroom excepted — is open plan, with patio doors from the living room area leading onto a timber deck in the back garden where there is potential to extend. Upstairs are three bedrooms and a deluxe bathroom.
“The house is all about elegance and timelessness and practical decisions regarding the space,” says Ms Kremenskiene says.
Soft colour tones are evident throughout (the owner describes the ground floor colour palette as “subtle and warm”), with deeper tones throughout the first floor in the bedrooms, which Ms Kremenskiene says are what you need “after a stressful day at work” “a place where you can relax”.
There is also the option of cosying up by the Hota multi-fuel stove “an essential part of the house, not only for the purpose of heat but for the magical view of a real fire”, the interior decorator says.
Other nice touches in this 105 sq m, €340,000 house include luxury Karndean flooring, quality first-floor carpets and a rainhead shower in the main bathroom.
Ms Kremenskiene says she has put the “best of everything” into Avoca, and will really miss the great location it’s in, close to Douglas village and its many retail and hospitality options.
Avoca also comes with off-street parking for two cars on its cobblestone drive.
Selling agent John D Sullivan of JD Sullivan and Co says the owner is moving only because she relishes the prospect of “doing it all again”.
“She is hoping to either buy a site or buy a house that needs an awful lot of work. She is staying in Co Cork, as she has a lot of work in Cork and Kerry,” he says.
He believes the house, which comes with the furnishings, will appeal to either first-time buyers or someone looking to downsize.
Ms Kremenskiene, a Lithuanian who trained as a milliner, lived in Killarney prior to moving to Grange Park, and as a lover of horse racing, was an enthusiastic supporter of the four-day race festival in Kerry’s main town.
In fact, she made local headlines in 2016 after she was crowned Dawn Milk Queen of Fashion at Ladies Day, wearing an outfit offset by one of her own headpieces. For her troubles, she won a VIP trip for two to Paris.
The following year, she won Most Stylish Lady competition at Gowran Park races in Kilkenny, wearing a tunic she bought in Blush, one of the many retail units at the Douglas Village Shopping Centre forced to close almost a year ago following a catastrophic fire.
When Ms Kremenskiene moved to Cork in 2016 after buying Avoca, she set up AK Interior. The renovation in 2017 of well-known Douglas watering hole, The Briar Rose, is also part of her portfolio.
Hats off to this high-end home.
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