Haven sent for ¤2.25m
All aspects of the Arts and Crafts style are evident throughout this 1920’s house, writes Katy McGuinness
32 Zion Road, Rathgar, Dublin 6
ASKING PRICE: €2.25M
AGENT: Sherry Fitzgerald (01) 4907433
DESIGNED by Howard Cooke, an architect employed by the Board of Works, No 32 Zion Road, Rathgar, Dublin 6 is a very unusual double-fronted detached house in the Arts and Crafts style which dates from around 1926. Its elaborate interiors are about as much full-on Arts and Crafts as you’ll get in Ireland.
Arts and Crafts was an early 20th-century design philosophy which began in Britain in the 1880s and quickly spread around the world before petering out in the
1930s. Bucking against mass production, it emphasised hand-made workmanship, quality of craft and decoration for the sake of it.
The house is tucked away on the part of Zion Road that leads to the gates of High School in Rathgar, facing out on to the school’s playing fields. The house sits behind mature hedging and there is parking for several cars to the front.
The vendors, who are only the third owners of the house, added a covered verandah by McNally Joinery that spans the front. It must be a pleasant place to sit when the wisteria that covers it is in bloom.
Now down-sizing, when they bought No 32 in 1998, they didn’t have far to move — just a short distance down the road from No 18.
“We had always fancied this one,” they say. Inside, the original part of the house lies to the front, while a substantial extension to the back, also built by the current owners, brings the total amount of living space to 2691 sq ft. The craftsmanship that is the hallmark of the Arts and Crafts style is evident throughout the original house in the doors, panelling and ceiling coving, and the vendors went to great lengths to replicate this in the new part of the house, including the commissioning of 13 handmade doors, each one a different size.
To the right of the entrance hall is the family room with an original Arts and Crafts fireplace. To the other side of the hall is a cosy library or den, with a wood-burning stove that heats the water for the house, while straight ahead is the kitchen, with cupboards in mahogany and integrated appliances.
A glass-roofed garden room floored in Portuguese limestone, with an inglenook fireplace and a wood-burning stove, opens out to the gardens. Off the garden room are a home office suite, incorporating a lavatory and shower, and a back kitchen or butler’s pantry. The other principal room in the new part of the house, which blends seamlessly with the old, houses a full-size snooker table, a bar and a projector screen so that it can also be used as a home cinema.
“Our sons were reluctant to leave No 18,” say the owners, “and we persuaded them by saying that they could have a snooker room. We modelled it on the one at Standen House in Sussex, and Ken Doherty played here at our son’s 18th birthday.”
The door to a small media cupboard — there is a surround sound system installed — is marked with the names and heights of all the children who have lived in the house back as far as 1926.
Upstairs, there are four bedrooms — three doubles and a single.
The master bedroom is decorated in the French boudoir style with toile de jouy fabrics and wallpaper, and has a large dressing room and ensuite, as well as a balcony. One of the other bedrooms is also ensuite and there is a family bathroom.
Up a steep flight of steps is an attic room with a nautical theme.
The current owners are keen gardeners. There’s a wisteria-covered pergola and, even at this late stage of the year, the tomato plants in the greenhouse are heavy with fruit, while a kitchen garden has fruit trees and a number of raised beds for herbs and vegetables.
Rathgar Village is a short walk away.