Cast-away: €770k Lahinch home eyes up TV's Smother set-piece, sea and scenery

High-end build faces West Clare classic Moy House, the focal point of hit TV show Smother

Fri, 18 Mar, 2022 - 16:00

Property Editor Tommy Barker reports

Lahinch, Co Clare
€770,000
Size	220 sq m (2,340 sq ft)
Bedrooms	4
Bathrooms	3
BER	B2

THE view from this high-end Cregg, Lahinch home includes not just the wild Atlantic shoreline at this rugged Co Clare setting, it also includes what’s become one of Ireland’s most familiar country pads, Moy House.

Scene-setter: Lahinch's Moy House. 1999 Pic: Kieran Clancy

The hugely popular TV series Smother is set in and around Lahinch, and the period, restored mansion Moy House (pic, here) with its distinctive turret is almost a scene-stealing character in its own right in the show, which has just recently been green-lighted for a third series.

Moy House was built in the 1800s for Sir Augustine Fitzgerald, who had a 9,000 acre Clare estate, with his main residence at Newmarket on Fergus: Lahinch was his summer home base – a bit like how many of the coastal community’s subsequently-built private homes have also been used. The place traditionally has heaved in summer, and contracted in winters.

However, the success of the resort as a year-round surf destination (with surf school and proximity to monster waves off the Clare coast) had already lengthened the season, ever before the arrival of the global Covid-19 pandemic, and the work from home phenomenon has also seen many more individuals and families base themselves full-time on the west coast shoreline.

Imposing: agent Danielle Kavanagh of Sherry FitzGerald McMahon guides at €770,000

A house well able to accommodate any sized family, for full-time, part-time and ideal for a work/life balance, is fresh to market with agent Danielle Kavanagh, of Sherry FitzGerald McMahon, who guides the very-well finished house (built initially as a holiday home) with stand-out joinery features internally at €770,000.

Set just above the main N67 as it wends its way into Lahinch from the Miltown Malbay road, it’s at a spot called Crag (or, Cregg) and is one of five quite substantial one-off houses, with ocean views to the west and south over Liscannor Bay, and with Moy House imperiously set on a height above a long stretch of sand and shingle beach, a few fields and a stream away over the N67.

The beaches at Cregg and Moy are Lahinch’s more niche ones, separate to the 2km long stretch right by the resort village itself and hugely popular with bathers, surfers, kite surfers, canoeists, and other watersports lovers, while the dunes are also a links home to the famed ‘Old’ Lahinch Golf Course (it has played host to the Irish Open) and the second, adjacent Lahinch Castle course.

Joinery by Ennis-based Noel Keane of Ennis Staircases

Sherry Fitz’s Ms Kavangah describe this Crag-set home as representing “the epitome of luxury living, in a private enclave of only five properties, on a half-acre, elevated landscaped site and has the most amazing panoramic sea views to the front and countryside views to the rear.”

It was designed for its owners by West of Ireland-based architect Howard Konick, and the vendor’s brother Noel Keane gets and deserves credit for the above-spec feature internal joinery, in a range of hardwoods. Most notable are some Scots Pine ceiling beams, timber coving, oak doors and the open-tread walnut stairs, via his company Ennis Stairway, which leads to the main, first floor where this home’s main rooms all are set, in an upside-down layout to maximise views.

Ground floor bedrooms: this one has a bay window

It’s got four ground floor bedrooms, one of them en suite plus main bathroom, gloss-tiled hall with a double-height stairwell, with tall, glazed and multi-paned curving section with open tread stairs in walnut.

Above, much of the accommodation is quite open plan, about 40’ from end to end, with a feature keyhole-shaped fire surround with inset stove, access to a viewing balcony at the living end and there’s a tall, apex shaped section by the central kitchen with sitting spot for view soaking.

Surfing students braving the elements at Lahinch Surf School. Pic: Don Moloney / Press 22

It gets a B2 BER, is in immaculate condition on an easy keep half acre site (lots of it is pea gravel) while alongside the main residence is a lofted, two-storey studio, about 58 sq m metres or over 600 sq ft, with power and plumbing: it could be ideal for guests, either family and friends of paying ones (?) or as a home office, with a short ten-second commute from door to door.