Murtagh hoteliers created a five-star €750k harbour home in Cobh

Late architect Stephen Kowalski pursued an interesting angle when building this distinctive home

Harbour View, Ballymore, Cobh

Cobh, Co Cork
€750,000
Size	190 sq m (2045 sq ft)
Bedrooms	4
Bathrooms	3
BER	C1

HARBOUR View House had barely dropped anchor on the market when a bid came in from overseas. Why buyers might like it is easy to see: coastal setting, superb views, bold build.

Viewed from above, it’s shaped like a sideways ‘Y’. 

The late Stephen Kowalski, the architect who designed it, came at it from an interesting angle. He focused on capturing sunlight and ensuring its residents could feast on glittering harbour views. 

To achieve this, he turned the main daytime accommodation towards the sun and the bedroom windows to the west, facing sunsets. 

The design delivered on its promise and also created a clear division between living and sleeping quarters.

The people to benefit from Mr Kowalski’s carefully calculated angles were John and Teresa Murtagh. The couple commissioned their neighbour architect to come up with a home they could enjoy in their golden years. They’d put in the hard yards for decades, running the Rinn Ronain Hotel, in Rushbrooke, a property built in the mid-1800s as the family home of prominent Cork railway engineer Joseph Ronayne, but more fondly remembered as a hotel by locals in Cobh.

The Murtaghs retired from the business in the 1990s and sold the hotel in 1998. It subsequently fell into dereliction, and in 2019, real estate investment company Urban Green Private (headed up by Tom Coughlan of the Marina Market) applied for planning permission to build four houses. Permission was given.

As the hotel is long gone, the Murtagh’s property legacy is Harbour View House in Ballymore — and it’s remarkably fresh-looking for a 20-year-old home.

“It’s obvious that quality materials were used,” says selling agent Lawrence Sweeney of Savills. He’s already seeing interest from North America — “US buyers are predominantly chasing water views” — but expects local interest too and enquiries from Cork City. Mr Sweeney said they have a lot of house hunters “who have been looking for a while and I think this property will fit their criteria”.

The Ballymore home has a striking appearance, along with that enviable south-facing aspect and coastal outlook, with vistas across the harbour to Aghada and Whitegate. Moreover, even though it’s a roomy 2,000 sq ft with a good lateral spread and generous front terrace, there’s no sense of it being shoehorned into the site.

 At a generous two acres, there’s room for another home — if planning permission was given. There is precedent. Planning was previously granted for a granny flat. Although that has lapsed, it does demonstrate that planners have looked favourably at additional accommodation on the site. It might be something for forward-looking buyers to mull over in a property market that offers little hope to our kids.

At any rate, there’s plenty of scope to watch the world go by and solve its many crises while sitting out on that fine patio, or in the lounge or sunroom.

 Light pours into the large lounge, where glass doors slide open to the terrace. 

Steps lead from the lounge to the kitchen where more glass doors slide open to a veranda. 

The veranda leads to the semi-circular sunroom. Beyond the sunroom, the main bedroom is the only one of four with a harbour view.

All of the bedrooms are to the front of the house, pulled out like a concertina, so that windows all face west. 

On the opposite side of the front entrance, you will find a study and a small sitting room, with sliding doors to the outside. An adjoining “handy storage garage could be converted to a fifth bedroom, maybe taking in the adjoining living room too”, Mr Sweeney says.

Although Harbour View House was built for a couple ready to put their feet up, it’s tailor-made for a family. The grounds would make a wonderful playground and the site is quite private, surrounded by hedging or fencing.

 A detached double garage — wth power and attic storage — could be converted into a home office/workshop/gym. 

A separate greenhouse is behind shrubbery.

Mr Sweeney says Harbour View House is “an exceptional family home” where the lounge provides “a panoramic harbourside tableau”.

“Space, light, and landscape converge, offering peace, privacy, and incomparable coastal scenery,” the agent adds.

Moreover, Walterstown national school is just 1km away, Cobh town centre/railway station is a 6km trip, and Cork City is 23 kms away. Bus and rail links to the city are excellent and improving.

VERDICT: One-of-a-kind home with dazzling, front-row, harbour views. Families trading up and overseas lifestyle-driven buyers likely to compete.