Joyce around the back in D3
The two-storey over basement house was restored from top to bottom, writes Katy McGuinness
6 Inverness Road Fairview, Dublin 3 ASKING PRICE: €625,000
AGENT: Gallagher Quigley, (01) 8183000
IN 1900 and 1901 James Joyce lived with his family at 8 Inverness Road, a couple of doors along from Number 6, which has just been placed on the market. At the time Joyce was a student at UCD’s Newman House, reading English, French and Italian. The census of 1901 lists him, at the age of 19, as residing at Royal Terrace (as Inverness Road was then known) with his mother and father, six brothers and three sisters.
It must have been a crowded house and James, the eldest, apparently took to slipping in and out via the back lane to avoid the scrutiny and interrogation of his father, who considered him something of a waster. In fact, Joyce was already writing articles for publications such as the Fortnightly Review and Arthur Griffith’s United Irishman, although his fondness for the gargle undoubtedly contributed to his father’s disapproval.
The back lane features in Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, an autobiographical coming-of-age novel in which the character of Stephen Dedalus is the alter ego of the young Joyce.
These days, most of the 18 houses on Inverness Road are owner-occupied by families, although probably none of them has as many children as the Joyces did, and the back lane has been taken over by the residents so that their children have a safe and secure place in which to play and move between one another’s gardens.
The current owners of Number 6 bought the property at auction in December 2005 and understand that the house dates from around 1880, when Inverness Road and the three avenues — Waverley, Lomond and Melrose — that run perpendicular to it were all built by a Scottish architect who resided at 1 Royal Terrace. The houses on the avenues were for the workers at the DWD (Dublin Whiskey Distillery) Jones Road Distillery founded by John Brannick on the banks of the Tolka river, one of the six great Dublin distilleries, which continued distilling until 1941. The distillery itself has since been developed as the luxury Distillery Lofts.
Back in 2005, Number 6 was uninhabitable and had lain vacant for some time. The owners set about a top to bottom restoration that took the best part of two years, and which has resulted in a fine family home where the comforts of modern day living are provided for in an elegant period house with 1,938 sq ft of living space.
The restoration included the rewiring and replumbing of the house, the installation of Fairco double-glazed sash windows and extensive insulation, and the restoration of the original front railings.
The two-storey over basement house retains many period features, including high ceilings, polished wood floors and original fireplaces, which the owners took out, restored and reinstated. The condition of some original features including doors, skirtings, coving and dado rails was so poor that they could not be restored, but the owners commissioned replicas to match what would have been there, including doors in solid oak.
Off the entrance hall are two reception rooms with large fireplaces and bay windows; one of these is currently used as a bedroom and has an en-suite shower room. On the first floor there are two double bedrooms and a family bathroom with free-standing bath.
The current owners built a single storey extension to the rear of the property at garden level and installed a hand-made, country-style kitchen with stand-alone Smeg appliances, an integrated dishwasher and a wood burning stove to keep things cosy.
The kitchen has a vaulted ceiling with skylights and a large island unit with granite worktops. Patio doors lead out to the landscaped paved patio garden which is west facing and catches the evening sun. The garden backs onto the grounds of a hospital, and the front aspect of the house is directly down Waverley Avenue.
Also at garden level are a dining room, which is open-plan to the kitchen, a living room and a shower-room, which means that there is a bathroom on each of the three floors, each fitted out by Fired Earth.
Decoratively, the house is in good order, with a tasteful palette of Farrow and Ball paint colours used throughout.
Outside, there is on street parking for residents; the city centre is a 20-minute walk away — much less by bike — and the airport is a 15-minute drive.
Now that work brings the owners to the other side of the country, they are selling up and plan to buy again in Co Clare. They say that they will miss the proximity to Croke Park, the frequency of the 123 bus into town, Westwood gym with its 50m pool, walks on Dollymount beach, the cycleway that goes almost all the way from Fairview to Howth, pints in Gaffney’s and relaxed weekend meals in Kennedy’s.
The back lane has been taken over by residents so that children have a safe place to play