Time has made a difference to Woodlands. The house, which started out in the 1800s as a simple country cottage, just two miles from the pretty Wicklow village of Aughrim, has spread.
Extended over the years, it has grown, and grown up to be a sprawling yet elegant five- bedroomed pile, of 374sq m (4,025sq ft), on a 10-acre site.
A shorter span of time has also made a difference to the ownership.
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Although the current owner completed on the house just shy of three years ago for €665,000, grandchildren have since arrived and there’s nothing like a desire to be close to the next generation to put a property, however lovely, back on the market. Woodlands is now for sale with Sherry FitzGerald for €1.35 million.
Deliciously private, you reach the house along a tree-lined avenue, and enter via an impressively-sized hallway, with a drawing room off to the left, and stairs up to a mezzanine. There you’ll find an inner hall, one of the bedrooms, plus the dining room and kitchen (with Aga). The house rambles over three levels, which sounds a little confusing, but isn’t at all, the split level design giving lovely features like a raised patio, which can be accessed from inside by both the dining room and kitchen.
There’s also a large glass-fronted music room/ lounge, and the bedroom above it also has an impressive glass façade.
“The views,” says the owner, “oh the views: from every single room, right over to the mountains, they’re amazing.”
Add to this a games room and living room that could also be a very substantial home office, and you soon realise you’re a long way from cottage living now.
Despite having had the house for a relatively short time, the owner has redecorated, updated some of the electrics and generally has it all in pristine walk-in condition. She also made some brilliant enhancements to the grounds, which include a three-bay shed, with four loose boxes for all your horsey needs.
It is tennis that the owner loves, however, and Woodlands comes with a hard court. “One day I was playing, and I heard water. Investigating, I found a stream,” she says.
The stream has been cleared and opened up, and there is now a winding tree-lined path. This can be illuminated at night, right down to the river Ow where deer come out to meet you and in which brown trout swim.
What could be nicer?
