Family weddings, birthdays and glittering garden parties have been the stuff of Burleigh Lodge at the centre of the Burnaby estate in Greystones, Co Wicklow, for more than half a century.
The house, designed in 1905 by Albert Murray, a former president of the Royal Institute of the Architects in Ireland, seems to have been built for entertaining on a grand scale. The Tudor-style home sits on substantial, mature grounds complete with its own ballroom and no fewer than seven bedrooms.
While the Burnaby, with its arts-and-crafts style homes has long been considered one of the country’s most desirable addresses, Burleigh Lodge at its heart has also been noted as one of the area’s “most impressive dwellings” and “perhaps the best example” of the Domestic Revival style by the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage. The property extends to 409sq m (4,402sq ft) and has a lowly F Ber rating, which will likely need addressing.
Although in need of a cosmetic refresh, with an asking price of €1.45 million, Burleigh Lodge is being offered for sale at a keener price than some of its modernised contemporaries. The recently refurbished Ellerslie, also on St Vincent Road, is being offered for sale for €2.385 million. Another refurbished property on St Vincent Road, The Tunnel, sold last year for €2.8 million. Other homes in the area are on the market for prices in the region of €2.8 million. A selling agent for Lisney Sotheby’s International Realty points to the property’s need for modernisation when asked about the comparatively low asking price.
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The fact Burleigh Lodge has been well looked after over the years is a distinct advantage. The house retains most of its original features, including ornate wooden fireplaces, brass window handles and hanging bells in the kitchen, which are operated by push buttons in the reception rooms and bedrooms. The bells would in the past have summoned the household staff, when required.
Burleigh Lodge is oriented towards Portland Road but is approached by a long, tree-lined avenue from St Vincent Road, the avenue affording visitors no glimpse of the house as they arrive. The effect is almost complete seclusion, with lawns and shrubberies and mature trees creating a tranquil setting.
A unique, stained glass front door leads to the grand entrance hall, its staircase sweeping past multipaned windows overlooking the garden. A newel post light depicting a woman in bronze is at the foot of the stairs.
Despite its extensive footprint, Burleigh Lodge can be a cosy home, with its formal diningroom and drawingroom. The drawingroom overlooks the gardens on three sides, most notably through a large bay window. Upstairs in this part of the house are four bedrooms and a family shower room with a separate loo. A glazed cloister-like corridor leads to what would have been staff quarters with a second staircase leading down to the kitchens. A further three bedrooms are in this part of the house.
Back downstairs, the diningroom opens through three sets of French doors to a fully glazed veranda, which runs the length of the house – one of the property’s most attractive and characteristic features. The veranda, with its multipane windows, links the main house to the ball or billiard room, passing along the way the rather grandly titled “vine house”. An inner hall leads to the kitchen, with its four-door Aga, a utility room and a pantry.
A door leads from a scullery to an enclosed yard with separate loo while a back hall leads to two of the three bedrooms in this part of the house. New owners may want to reorganise some of these rooms for the way families live today, creating perhaps a bigger kitchen and an informal dining area.
The gardens at Burleigh Lodge have been diligently looked after for more than 100 years. The current owners are in the hospitality business and entertained lavishly here. Tuxedo-clad waiters have walked the gardens, pouring prosecco cocktails on summer’s evenings. But the family has grown and moved now and it is time for a new family to make their own memories at Burleigh Lodge.
