The owner of a large six-bed near Dundrum Town Centre and the Balally Luas stop always wanted a house with lots of light — and that’s what she got when her husband built Winterberry and the semi-detached house next door in 2007. The open-plan kitchen/diningroom/sunroom at the back of the house is filled with light from a vaulted ceiling with a window at its apex and windows all around.
The house is near the top of busy Kilmacud Road Upper, in the heart of suburbia, but it also has a slightly rural edge, backing on to Airfield Estate, the 38-acre urban farm and gardens popular with families. Winterberry, the 424 sq m (4,560 sq ft) three-storey, semi-detached house is for sale for €2.15 million through Sherry FitzGerald. It has underfloor heating downstairs and a B1 Ber rating.
The owner had a lot of input into the design of the house, which the couple moved into when their four children were young. As well as being bright, it has lots of storage. On the top floor, for example, there is an area with floor-to-ceiling wardrobes; the door of one opens to reveal shelves filled from top to bottom with shoes for all occasions. The house’s six bathrooms are particularly smart, with marble floors and marble-topped units in some; in others, walls are part-tiled — with tiles from Regan Tiles in Dún Laoghaire — with mosaic borders.
A large triple-height, marble-floored entrance hall leads directly to the kitchen/diningroom/family room-sunroom, with more formal reception rooms off its left. The kitchen, with a tiled floor and lots of glass-fronted cabinets, was based on Mark Wilkinson kitchen designs, says the owner. Painted Bone China blue (a Little Greene paint) it has a large island unit topped with pale quartz, a contrast to the black marble countertops. The island has a lot of storage underneath as well as a wine fridge. There’s a good-sized pantry concealed behind cupboard doors and a washer and dryer behind more doors.
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Two steps lead down from the kitchen to the family room/diningroom: floored with American white oak. It’s spacious, with room for seating on one side, a table — that can be expanded to seat up to 14 — at the other. There are views from here of the Dublin Mountains and French doors open into the back garden.
The interconnecting reception rooms off the front hall have matching limestone fireplaces. The drawingroom at the front has a bay window; the livingroom has a panelled wall and double glass doors opening on to a back patio.
There’s a large, smart downstairs toilet off the entrance hall, partly wallpapered with a bright balloon design. A door in the hall opens on to stairs leading down to the basement, which includes a gym.
Upstairs, the large main bedroom has glass-fronted built-in wardrobes, views across Airfield, and a large luxurious en suite. This has a marble-tiled floor, marble-topped vanity unit, step-in shower and claw foot bath next to a window — you could relax here with a view of the Dublin mountains. The en suite of another bedroom has a pink-tiled floor, another bedroom has an en suite with a blue-tiled floor. The third bedroom on this floor has been turned into an office, with a wall unit of shelves, drawers, mirror-fronted cupboards and a seating area.
There are three bedrooms on the top floor, two with a shared bathroom. The views over Airfield to the mountains from the two bedrooms at the back are the best in the house.
The focal point of the landscaped back garden is a small putting green with a pond at its centre. A circular gravel path runs around it, bordered on both sides with box hedging. Borders are filled with trees — including cypress and bay trees — and there are several patio areas, including one in a sheltered corner next to the back wall. There is plenty of room to park in the gravelled front garden.
