A smartly presented Marino family home within “come in for your dinner” shouting distance of the nearest green where the kids play in a free-range fashion.
As the first major suburban development of the Irish Free State, the development of Marino brought the so-called garden city concept by English urban planner Ebenezer Howard to life on this side of the Irish Sea.
Howard advocated a model that combined the best of urban and rural features, placing strong emphasis on shared communal green spaces and a movement away from the slum-ridden and congested city core.
Address: 92 Brian Road, Marino, Dublin 3, D03A8P7
Asking price: €695,000
Agent: Sherry FitzGerald Clontarf
The red terracotta-roofed houses were provided on a tenant purchase model, essentially to create property-owning citizens, but the payments were beyond the wages of general labourers.
Most of this sylvan part of Dublin 3 is now in private ownership, but the sense of community fostered remains. Each street radiates out from the round green bounded by trees.
The kids play here in a free-range fashion that is being lost elsewhere.
Number 92 Brian Road is within “come in for your dinner” shouting distance of one of the greens on Marino’s longest thoroughfare, which cuts through the neighbourhood.
The three-bedroom, two-bathroom terraced house still has its original front railing and gate and opens into a colour-drenched hall, its ceiling and walls all painted a cerulean blue, with a blue and white patterned tile underfoot.
The front room is a sitting room that has built-in storage on either side of its tiled inset fireplace.
There is a downstairs bathroom cum utility room off the hall.
The heart of the C3 BER-rated house is the open-plan living cum diner kitchen, which is set out in a broken plan.
It opens into the living area, which is over 14 sq metres in size.
Its alcoves are painted a forest green, and there is a freestanding wood-burning stove set into the fireplace, which has a brick surround.
A half-wall screens the kitchen from immediate view, but you can see through to the dining area, where a sloped roof rises to meet a bank of clerestory windows.
This approach brings light into the middle of such a big room. This part measures almost 23 square metres.
The kitchen is really smartly appointed with units in an L-shaped configuration and an island bordering the space.
The counter cabinets are painted a deep steely blue, while the above counter units recede into the soft white of the walls. The sink and hob are on the outside wall. The timber countertops add warmth.
Double doors open out to the southerly garden, where there is a further 14 square metres of space in the garden room.
Upstairs, there are three bedrooms, a double and a single at the front.
A second double overlooks the back, which is where the family bathroom also is.
There is on-street resident’s disc parking.
Agents Sherry FitzGerald is seeking €695,000 for the house, which extends to 105 square metres.
