A house that forms part of our nation-building past was purchased by Ireland’s original interiors blogger. Beautifully decorated, the lakeside property is within a two-minute walk of the Poulaphouca reservoir that drowned a village, it comes with 0.75 acres, costs €349k, and is within commuting distance of Dublin.
One-time interiors blogger Zita Spring and her partner Jamie Holmes, a Co Antrim man, have always been ahead of the curve.
Pre-Covid, they had been talking about moving out of Dublin.
When he asked her what her ideal home would be, her response was, “If we could take out home in Crumlin, nothing bigger, and move it beside a lake, that would be it."
Then she had a dream about Mays Cottage, before it appeared on one of the property portals the next morning.
Address: Mays Cottage, Crosscoolharbour, Blessington, Wicklow, W91 W9P8
Asking price: €349,000
Agent: JP & M Doyle
It was like she manifested it. The creator of Homebug, Ireland’s original interiors blog, a site beloved by the interiors press and home decorators everywhere, moved out of the city with Jamie and their two dogs for a completely different pace of life.
The house is part of Blessington’s historic past.
At 10:00 am on March 3, 1940, the sluice gates at the newly constructed dam were closed.
This flooded the upper Liffey valley in County Wicklow to create the Poulaphouca Reservoir, often referred to as the Blessington Lakes, for a hydroelectric project by the Electricity Supply Board (ESB).
One of the big infrastructural projects conducted by the state in its early years, over 75 families were displaced for what politicians described as the greater good of the nation.
Some 6,000 acres of farmland, bog, and the village of Ballinahown, home to 76 families, were submerged, displacing local families who had lived in the valley for generations.
All was lost to the water.
One of these families was the Mays, who in the 1930s were moved to a two-bedroom, one bathroom, semi-detached home on a cul-de-sac at Crosscoolharbour, mere minutes from the water’s edge.
It must have been bittersweet.
A brand-new home with an indoor toilet would have been welcome, but they lost their compulsory-purchased homestead.
And yet such collateral damage is essential to ensure large infrastructural projects can be conducted.
Named after the family, Mays Cottage is set on the north-west corner of the Blessington Lakes.
It is screened from the water by mature trees but is within a two-minute walk of the water’s edge.
Inside, the 57 square metre property has been tastefully upgraded by its owners.
The egg yolk yellow front door opens into a porch with a terracotta and ochre yellow quarry- tiled floor.
A door with amber-detailed leaded glass, redolent of the 1930s, adds intrigue and texture and opens through to the living room where jewel-toned velvet seating is set around an off-centre wood-burning stove which sits on a raised hearth that has a painted brick surround.
A cornflower blue door opens into the kitchen, which is at the back.
It has shaker-style cabinet doors, the first of which are painted a spring green by The Little Green Paint Company.
The main part of the eat-in kitchen is painted a fashionable yellow that is sunny and delightful.
It leads out to a south-facing paved terrace.
Upstairs there are two double bedrooms. The principal has a free-standing wardrobe and is clutter-free.
The second bedroom is multi-purpose and used as a home office. The cast iron fireplace is painted a mauve pink.
The lake views from Mays Cottage are seasonal, Zita explains.
“In the summer, we're surrounded by lush greenery. When the leaves fall away in the autumn, a glistening lake view is revealed for autumn, winter and spring.”
You can swim, kayak, SUP or sail on the lakes, as the couple has enjoyed.
When at the shore, looking directly across the grey waters towards the mountains to the southwest is the granite village of Ballyknocken.
Its quarries were reportedly developed to provide quality granite stone for the construction of the nearby Russborough house, the 52-roomed mansion built for the Leeson family, the Earls of Milltown.
The granite also covers much of the paving of Georgian Dublin.
Zita and Jamie are moving onto a new project and are again ahead of the curve.
They’re heading north to Co Antrim, to take advantage of the more affordable housing stock in Northern Ireland.
The province also has a wider range of property stock options within their price bracket. It is also Jamie’s home county.
He’s been living in Dublin and Wicklow for the last 20 years and wants to go back north.
For Zita, who manages Saoirse Book Club, a feminist reading community that supports Ireland’s domestic violence charity, Saoirse, she can commute to Dublin from Belfast on the Enterprise service, which runs up to 15 times a day and has you in Connolly station in about two hours and 10 minutes.
Agents JP & M Doyle is seeking €349,000 for the C BER-rated home.
