West Cork's pretty in pink Burren Cottage is an authentic coastal charmer

Postcard pretty, pink and purty its in private setting, the €975k 3,000 sq ft Burren Cottage is a period delight

Fri, 16 Aug, 2024 - 16:59

Property Editor Tommy Barker reports

Kilbrittain, West Cork
€975,000
Size	284 sq m (3,000 sq ft)
Bedrooms	4
Bathrooms	3
BER	F

CALLED after the local townland of Burren, near Kilbrittain along the Wild Atlantic Way, the postcard-pretty and pretty in pink Burren Cottage lays claim to a long history — as much as 300 years, reckon the owners, who’ve been here for a mere fraction of its centuries’ long life.

How long? Oh, they’ve ‘only’ been here a mere 39 years.

Coastal setting for Burren Cottage, near Kilbrittain.

The family, with linkages going back to deeper, further west along the coastline, bought the cottage in the mid-1980s, which is privately set above the main coastal road between Kinsale and Clonakilty and put down long-term roots four decades ago, with four children reared to now-mature adulthood.

Grandchildren have followed too, plus dogs… labradors, of which the current lively lab Boo is the 13th of the breed to roam the tended grounds: clearly, loyalty here between canines and humans is a two-way street.

After all the decades, it’s finally downsize time, though and the absolute charmer of a ‘cottage’ on a discrete, set-back acre of mature gardens is listed with Clonakilty-based estate agent Andy Donoghue of Hodnett Forde, jointly with Sheery Brothers in Kinsale.

Cottage might be a bit of a misnomer for a 3,000 sq ft, four-bed two-storey home extended years’ back by the current owners who built over a single storey add-on, with a lovely mix of rooms on both levels, variously connected by no fewer than three internal staircases, well spaced out, and all of them well colonised with full trappings of an active family life.

It’s trove of personal and family items, books, books and more books, furnished in a mix of old pine and gleaming heirloom items, photos and pictures, with four double bedrooms in all, with the option of a ground floor/fifth bedroom with fireplace with stove and French doors to the garden.

It comes with three bathrooms too, all of them decorated in a timeless and comfortable ‘country style,’ with coloured suites and toile de jouy wallpapers, with the main entry point by the large, flower-bedecked garden patio setting the tone: it’s a hardwood half-door, with gleaming polished brass door furniture leading to a vestibule.

Many rooms have soft neutral carpets, good fabrics are used for curtains and blinds, upstairs rooms have quaint dormer and sloping, wood-sheeted ceilings, while at ground level the main reception rooms have exposed timbers and beams.

Windows are side-hung casements in the main, with fragrant and floral plants along the outside walls and the sun terrace adding to the ‘chocolate box’ appeal: for those without sweet teeth, super-healthy tomato plants are seasonal delights, pushing themselves up through growing trellises and planters.

The layout shows the home’s evolution, largely L-shaped under slate roofs with slated dormers, and day use rooms include a large kitchen with Aga and units made in solid oak by local craftsman Eric Pearce who has had a workshop for decades nearby at Harbour View/Coolmain: one worktop is about a 12’ length of chunky oak, possibly from a tree as old as the house itself.

Oak kitchen was made by local craftsman Eric Pearce

As is typical of the time of its construction, the house is effectively one room wide, with one room leading to the next and turning into the next ‘wing,’ so several are double aspect.

Apart from the warm and homely kitchen/diner, there’s a formal dining room, with walls painted a deep red for evening time atmosphere; main living/drawing room with inglenook style chimney opening with brand-leading Charnwood stove (one of two from this maker in the property), second reception and sun room, plus boot room, all within original thick stone walls.

Hodnett Forde’s Andy Donoghue says Burren Cottage has portions dating to the 1700s “and retains much of its original form and character. This charming family home is presented in excellent condition having been lovingly restored, modernised and updated in the recent years by the current owners,” adding “it oozes charm and character, and offers much to those wishing to live in a period property in a peaceful location.”

Early interest is coming from a niche who particularly want a period home/farmhouse in an area within easy reach of Cork city, its international airport, hot-spot Kinsale, Bandon and Clonakilty.

Guiding at €975,000, he says also of appeal is the privacy of the acre, set a field back from a back road reached by a quiet farm lane and then a private drive (with electric gates), and it has sea glimpses rather than full ocean views.

The gardens run to about an acre, created by the owners from a raw overgrown field that first greeted them decades ago, and there’s also hidden garden areas, a compact double garage almost hidden by rambling climbing plants, plus a small lofted boathouse/store with possible upgrade potential.

Burren Cottage’s arrival for sale comes just weeks after the swift sale agreed for Padley, a more modern home of c 3,000 sq ft with an A2 BER on 1.75 acres of exceptional gardens near Howe Strand. It ran here in these pages in early June with a €925,000 AMV and is understood to have been snapped up for just under the €1 million mark.

Padley, near Howe Strand, Kilbrittain, quickly went sale agreed at close to €1m via Hodnett Forde

Mr Donoghue says Padley got interest from Irish viewers (both Cork and Dublin,) as well as from the US, noting the American buyer market in West Cork currently seems to be stronger than the UK-based home hunters; he expects some cross-over of viewers at this listing now too, given the similarity of location and proximity to the sea and beach at the likes of Flaxford Strand, Coolmaine, Harbour View, Garrettstown, and beyond Courtmacsherry across Coolmain Bay.

VERDICT: So pretty.