House of the Week: Glanmire, Co Cork

One of the few to have an indoor swimming pool in the recessionary '80s

Greybrook, Silversprings
€575,000
Size	290 sq m (3121 sq ft)
Bedrooms	7
Bathrooms	4
BER	C2

IT’S the kind of city site you might give your right arm for, and the late John Daly, a builder, was prepared to bide his time.

Forty three years ago, he was living near the Tank Field in Mayfield when the opportunity arose.

“Dad said if it ever came up for sale, he would buy it and when it did come up, he went for it straight away,” his son says.

Having purchased the house and land in Silversprings from Cornelius Dineen, a butcher in the English Market, Mr Daly set about doing what builders do: extending and renovating.

“He was a builder and he knew what he wanted. He gutted the whole house. For a while, there was no front and no sides to it,” his son says.

When two-storey detached Greybrook emerged from the chaos, it was a very different home. Not only did it have seven bedrooms and an American-style living room with arches to look through to the dining room, it also had a sauna and indoor swimming pool  —unheard of in the recessionary 80s, when Corkonions were just getting over the closure of the outdoor Lee Baths.

John Daly sometimes “took a notion”, his son says, and one such notion was to eventually replace that much-envied swimming pool with a home office which now takes up the bulk of a single storey wing. The good news, however, is that the once 40 ft swimming pool could be reinstated. While it was sealed and boarded over, Mr Daly Junior says it “wouldn’t take much to put it back to being a pool” — the filter house and pipework remain in place, and it could be a godsend in a pandemic, when public pools are strictly out of bounds.

The sauna is adjacent to what used to be the pool area and is fully functioning. There’s also two ensuite bedrooms, which could be adapted to playroom/study/home office/granny flat. 

Adjoining this section is the L-shaped kitchen, with inbuilt seating and a gorgeous red Aga, but otherwise in need of modernising. A door off the kitchen leads to the dining room which in turn leads to the living room. An usual feature is the double-sided fireplace, so both rooms get the benefit of a single fire.

The hallway is another unusual feature. Mr Daly also took a notion to demolish a hallway wall, doing away with a separate living room and creating a large reception area, a bit like what you might find in a hotel of yesteryear, complete with fireplace.

Upstairs, there are five bedrooms, of which the master bedroom is ensuite. Sanitary ware is of its time, but given the cyclical nature of fashion, could be in vogue again before you know it.

The grounds on which the 290 sq m house stands explain Mr Daly’s determination to acquire it at a time when this hill in Silversprings was no more than a laneway and not the busy thoroughfare that it is now. You can hardly hear the traffic though, it’s set well back from the road, on 0.625 of an acre, up a sloping drive where a weeping willow is one of many mature trees. To the rear is a west-facing patio, and at a higher level, a private little garden.

Selling agents Sam Kingston and Jennifer Roe of Casey & Kingston say the €575,000 house, which is currently under offer, holds lots of possibilities — as a trade-up family home or even as a guesthouse, with a pool and sauna.

Mr Daly Jr says it was a lovely family home for himself, his three siblings “and a couple of dogs”, although there was the drawback of cutting the vast lawn with a push mower. 

He is sorry to let Greybrook go, but believes it is time for another family to enjoy it.

Greybrook, which has a C2 energy rating thanks to more recent investment in glazing and insulation, is just off the Lower Glanmire Road, within minutes of Cork city and the link road. It has its own driveway. Two houses to the rear also built by Mr Daly have a separate entrance. 

VERDICT: A bit of imagination and investment will make this a talked-about house again.