Sligo-based solicitor and period property developer Damien Tansey is a believer in the credo less is more.
He is not a fan of what he calls glitzy glamour preferring “understatement and elegance” and he has found his niche.
Most recently he took numbers 78 and 80 Merrion Road, for example, and turned a pair of dowager dame redbricks into premium rental properties. The painstaking renovation took two years to complete and when they came to the rental market two years ago they were asking €13,000 per month.
On that project he partnered with architect Paul Brazil of Brazil Associates, a firm that has spent the last decade overhauling large suburban homes and upgrading them with a really light touch.
For much of his legal career Tansey has accumulated properties (including commercial investments such as Apollo House on Tara Street, which he managed to cash out of at the height of the market) and more recently he has focused on period properties, restoring their original features while amping up the spec to near new build levels.
Tansey’s development company is reported to have acquired this latest project, number 19 Pembroke Road, when it was set out as 11 apartments and three office units, for over €4 million. It had planning to refurbish the main building, demolish the side extension and construct 701sq m (7,545sq ft) of new accommodation to give 12 apartments; 10 two-beds, one one-bed and one one-bed plus study unit.
The listed property, built circa 1830, is a three storey over garden Georgian property with a Victorian extension added to the rear. Set on 0.34 acres with mature gardens to the rear, the 10ft high windows on its main floors flood the rooms in light. The result is a historic and contemporary hybrid with the new build, facaded in a tumbled brick to look like it has been there for years, connected to the heritage house by a glass atrium.
Agents Savills is bringing the properties; six units in the original Georgian building and six A-rated units in the new building to the side, to the market.
The historic apartments have retained their gorgeous original features that include decorative cornicing, Greek key details on the interconnecting architraves and large multi-paned windows. They also enjoy lofty ceiling heights, a feature that has been echoed in the new build units and executed with great care by Whelan and O’Keeffe builders, the firm that also did Tansey’s Merrion Road properties.
Prices start from €650,000 for the only one-bedroom in the development. This A-rated new build unit measures 54sq ft/577sq ft.
The most expensive unit is a two-bed penthouse of 86sq m /923 sq ft, also located in the new part of the property. It has higher ceiling heights and marvellous views of the Dublin Mountains as well as a balcony that enjoys south and west-facing aspects. It is seeking €1.1million.
The most charming buys will be in the original house where each apartment has a personality unique to it. Take the one-bedroom apartment plus study, for example. Measuring 71 sq m/770sq ft it is one of the show units and is being sold with its contents sourced by Studio Brazil Interior Architecture from CA Design, for €815,000.
Here a large open plan living area retains its original marble fireplace with an insert by Jamb and a New York-style kitchen that can be closed away behind fold-back doors, executed with real panache by O’Connors of Drumleck.
The flooring is by The Hardwood Floor Company but it is its original features, the decorative plasterwork and big window, overlooking a smart south-facing garden, designed by Karl Barnes of Formality and landscaped by Aspect Garden Construction, that will have real appeal for downsizers.
Another two-bed in the original part of the property is at garden level and will come with a small garden to its rear. This 82sq m/879sq ft unit is seeking €895,000.
Small families should take a look at the development’s two very smart duplexes. These offer period grace but on a smaller scale. One, in the Victorian extension to the rear of the main house, boasts a marvellously decorative ceiling and a fine Connemara marble fireplace in its open plan living cum kitchen, with perhaps the poshest utility room in Dublin, complete with ceiling rose, hived off the main space. The 112sq m / 1203 sq ft property has bedrooms at garden level and is asking €1.05million.
