It's a fair bet that most people, even literary types, when asked for a line from the unpromisingly titled 1946 poem Dark Haired Miriam Ran Away would be stumped; though prompt them that the poem was written by Patrick Kavanagh and better known as On Raglan Road and its lyrical lines would come tripping out.
The Ballsbridge road that gave its name to the much-loved poem is now far from a bohemian haunt – as it was in Kavanagh’s flat-land days – but these days it’s one of the priciest roads in the city. There’s an unmistakable air of privilege hanging over the tree-lined, quiet street and its many newly-renovated pristine houses.
Number 25, a three-storey over garden level redbrick, is in one of the early terraces, built in 1859, and by the time the current owners bought it nearly 20 years ago it had long been divided into eight bedsits.
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Then it sold at auction for £880,000 – a strong price at the time – and was bought by Bronach and Sydney Rowell. On the day of the auction they recall he was reluctant to bid, she was keen – their occupations might explain their differing attitudes to the massive renovation project; he’s an accountant and period renovations are notoriously expensive, she’s an interior designer who fell instantly in love with the truly impressive proportions of the early Victorian townhouse.
And two decades later her instinct has paid off. The house has been a very happy family home for them and their three children and now that it is time to downsize they have put in on the market with Knight Frank for €4.1 million.
In deciding on how to bring the 404sq m, 4,350sq ft house back into single family use, the first decision was where to put the kitchen – in these four-storey houses that dictates all else. Usually it is located down at garden level but as it is one of the most used rooms in the house Bronach put it at hall level to the rear, interconnecting with the front reception room.
The kitchen is styled as a comfortable family space, with an Aga and fitted with custom-built painted timber units on facing walls – while a vast dining table takes up the centre. There is access down to the rear garden via the hall floor return. This layout freed up the garden level where the two principal rooms were used as bedrooms by two of the Rowell children who were young adults when the family moved in and where they could come and go via the door underneath the tall flight of steps leading to the front door. A small kitchen and shower room in the return means that this level could be a self-contained apartment if new owners wish.
The finest rooms up on the first floor are used as they originally would have been – as gracious reception rooms and are now furnished in the plush style that’s a Rowell signature; Bronach has been an interior designer for nearly 30 years (many will remember her Harriet’s House shop on Dawson St). She and son Cormac now run their contract business and retail shop from Rowell Design in Donnybrook.
The look throughout the house is studied luxury – several walls are panelled, well-designed bespoke storage units are in most rooms, the walls are either covered with designer wallpaper or richly coloured paint and elaborate window treatments frame the house’s tall sash windows.
Underfloor heating at garden level, wiring for a sound system and a central vacuum system are just some of the more modern features of the renovation. Restoration of the house’s original features – such as the extensive decorative plasterwork and fireplaces – was helped by the fact that so much remained intact behind the bedsit partitions. Sydney recalls that nearly 80 per cent of the plasterwork was intact, and there were some pleasant surprises such as finding that that a set of interconnecting doors were hidden behind a plywood divider.
There are three double bedrooms, one with an en suite, at the top of the house as well as the family bathroom.
The back garden is small relative to the size of the house and it is laid out in a formal style, planted with extensive box hedging and three mirrors framed by trellis to make the space appear larger. The mews site had long been sold off by the time the Rowells moved in – the house built on it, Ayot Mews, was recently sold for more than €1 million.
There is off-street parking to the front for several cars.
