A terraced two-up two-down in a typical East Wall street is on the market at £135,000 having been given a stylish makeover in the last 18 months.
Light streams into 7 Moy Elta Road, Dublin 3, and nothing stands in its way. Huge mirrors, glass shelves, pale walls and floors ease its movement through the house.
When lighting and furniture designer Niamh Barry first walked into the tiny property with its tiny rooms and blocked off staircase she just saw through them to space. As they bade farewell to the former owners, Niamh and her partner, Killian McNulty, who works with film props and sells 20th century classic furniture, closed the front door and began to rip off all the orangey red wallpaper.
Within two days, many of the internal walls had been knocked down, the staircase exposed, and the bathroom stripped bare. As the couple stood on bare earth surrounded by unplastered walls, a neighbour called by and said: "that was a perfectly good house, you've just destroyed".
Now it is a comfortable and warm home thanks to the clever use of space lass doors off the living-room and kitchen. These open on to a wooden deck patio, creating the perfect place for dining out on sunny days.
The kitchen layout was changed to make the space more functional. The white units are in MDF and the floor is in Portuguese limestone.
This flooring runs through into the bathroom and even clads part of the wall. A deep bath tapers at one end to make room for the basin and lavatory. The fittings have been cleverly slotted into the space, which is made to look larger through the use of huge wall mirrors.
Upstairs, two walls that divide the bedroom from the staircase are in frosted glass, framed in powder-coated steel, again easing the path of light through the house. Two upstairs rooms were knocked into one large bedroom, although this was done in such a way as to allow fairly easy conversion back into two rooms.
An enormous mirror-fronted wardrobe encourages more tricks of light by conjuring up even more space.
As well as sweeping design statements used throughout the home, attention has been paid to detail. Each door handle has been carefully chosen right down to the Phillipe Starck-designed knobs on the airing cupboard. The stair handles in brushed stainless steel, and the fire surrounds in polished stainless steel are from the Glass Centre in Inchicore.
Although the couple planned to stay in this home for a long time, another house caught their eye and they are off to change another interior leaving this one to those who want a house full of light near the city centre.
The sale is being handled by Gunne Residential's Fairview office.
