'Crosser' home Wynfield turned out exactly as the architect's model indicated it would - a view from every room

Every room of architect-designed house built in 1997 on site above the coastal town has wonderful sea views, says Tommy Barker

V-shaped Wynfield has views Crosshaven in one direction and glimpses to Roches Point in the other thanks to its height

Crosshaven, Cork harbour
€1.3 million
Size	212 sq m ((2,280 sq ft)
Bedrooms	5
Bathrooms	4
BER	C3

"IT’S our haven home on the hill,” say Pat and Phil Vaughan, of Wynfield, the couple’s V-shaped Crosshaven family home, which they built in 1997, and only now selling to spend time with daughters and grandchildren abroad.

In the 90’s they had been spending enjoyable times around Crosshaven, when their three children were younger, and managed to buy an elevated site here — above the school and churches — from local farmer Christy Gash.

Keeping everything as local as they could, they used the services of a then-young architect, Mark Stapleton (MJS Architects), to come up with a design for the gently sloping, 0.5-acre site cut into the brow of the hill, on a cul de sac shared with just a handful of other houses.

Turns out, the views go two ways: Out over Crosshaven, Cobh, and Currabinny on one side, and then — thanks to the height — over to the mouth of Cork harbour, to the lighthouse at Roches Point and further headlands to the east.

“We told Mark we wanted light and views and he came back and said, ‘How do you like the idea of living in a V?’”

Angling the house in two sections (a bit like a wing,) meant every room got a view, all of them of water, many of them enthralling, and to make his point the just-qualified architect did a detailed scale model of the house that he was proposing and how the rooms angled for the various views.

Pat and Phil ‘got it’ straight away — from the precision of the model — of what would go on to become a 2,800 sq ft single-storey home, and could even envisage how rooms would work, flow, and be furnished, because the model’s roof came off in sections.

Model home

Today, the model is as good as the day it was made, and it has just been retrieved it from Wynfield’s attic as the couple prepare to move; whether they gift it to the buyer, or take it with them as a souvenir, has yet to be decided.

Might they pack it in a suitcase and bring it with them to Australia? Their two daughters and six grandchildren are ‘Down Under,’ so there’s every possibility and, since Pat’s retirement, they can spend as much as four months a year in Oz...another prompt to sell their own model home to give them freedom to travel and, “in any case, a house like this needs a family”, they say.

Wynfield is near Templebreedy parish church and above Coláiste Mhuire secondary school, a few minutes’ uphill walk of the water and marina, piers, pubs, and eateries in Crosser, and is pitched now to trade-up families by agents Ann O’Mahony and Stuart O’Grady, of Sherry FitzGerald, who guide it at €1.3m — the new sort of €1m+ benchmark for high-end Crosshaven and bays district homes with views and/or water proximity.

Apart from highlighting the medium and far-distant views — which sort of speak for themselves — the agents say the 1997 design “was ahead of its time, with its unconventional shape, open-plan layout and split levels, all of which were done to accommodate the site and take full advantage of those spectacular views”.

The main reception rooms face out to the water, via large windows, and there’s five bedrooms, all of them with a view. Maritime art adorns the walls, not surprisingly, as the family are in to sailing, what with Crosshaven being home to the venerable, 1720-founded Royal Cork Yacht Club and the harbour and coastline outside its mouth being a playground for anyone and everyone who loves the sea.

Notably, thanks to the unconventional, but highly practical, angled floorplan, the main reception rooms all have individual shapes, visual draws and features, the most distinctive being the curve of five hardwood steps leading down to the angled dining area, with five tall windows each framing different sections of view, while the lofty room shares the same sort of timber-panelled ceiling as the commanding kitchen above, not too dissimilar to the position of a ship’s bridge.

The kitchen has granite-topped, pale-painted units (by Carrigaline maker David Kiely) with utility off, and flooring in this section, plus in the adjacent family room — with a large, gas, cast-iron stove now replacing a wood burner in a tall chimney breast — is Canadian oak.

The same quality floor timber passes through the hall (where it mixes in a grid pattern with Chinese slate) and via double doors into a separate living room, with picture windows and a French fireplace.

Along the well-conceived floor plan in the other direction (with a guest loo near the reception rooms) are five double bedrooms, again oak-floored, one with en suite and walk-in robes, plus main family bathroom with cast-iron roll-top bath and separate shower, with all rooms in gleaming, ship-shape order.

A junction where the two main ‘V’ angles meets has a door to a private sun patio, and sunny, sheltered outdoor seating space, backed by a raised bed recently cleared back, with farmland hoving in to view directly behind, and still owned by the same local family from which the Vaughans bought their half-acre site 28 years ago.

Pat and Phil were advised at the start to employ and use local services and trades as much as possible, and they stuck to that advice, using the likes of builder Michael O’Halloran (now retired, they say), and electrician John Kiely, amongst others, and they say it paid dividends, in terms of getting quality delivered, while also making further connections with Crosshaven as they bedded in.

They are staying local, unsure exactly of their next move, but it is likely to be a smaller ‘lock up and leave’ house.

Wynfield: does exactly what the model proposed

But the couple relish the freedom to travel and visit grandchildren in Australia, while a young family will savour the package here, with a well-designed, always maintained spacious home all on the one level (bar the split-level dining space), with extensive landscaped gardens with lawns, decking and small feature pond, expansive printed concrete cobble drive and parking apron by a detached garage, perfect for a boat.
VERDICT: A design that stands the test of time, while the passing of time since this couple bought back in 1997, has seen beach-blessed Crosshaven take off as a year-round living spot, and not just for the holliers.