This October, the Permanent TSB Ideal Home Show celebrates Bliain na Gaeilge – the year of the Irish - with the Cúl Art Showhouse designed by architect, designer, artist and gaeilgeoir Róisín Murphy, and set in a fantastic Wild Atlantic Way Coastal Garden by renowned landscape designer Michael O Reilly.
Róisín will source limestone from Carlow, jade tones of Connemara marble and copper from Longford as well as featuring Irish craft including Waterford Crystal, Foxford Woollen Mills, Connemara Marble Products and other Irish manufacturers.
The Irish theme is sure to resonate with the 26,000 expected to attend, in search of ideas and inspiration for their homes. While many attend in search of interior design ideas, furnishings and décor, a significant portion of the event is given over to larger projects such as home extensions, renovations and major upgrades.
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The Build, Extend and Renovate Pavilion shows how to get the most out of your home by choosing to extend, build or remodel. It gives visitors access to all the suppliers they need to take a project from start to finish.
Those looking for an architect can sit in on one of the many talks taking place across the four-day event, with registered architects from the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI) on hand for specific advice and assistance, or just to chat about what’s possible.
Some of the architects taking part in this autumn’s show include Green Build, Ronan Rose Roberts, Circa Design, Optimise Design, The Architects, JE Architecture, Fergus Flanagan and Renova.
If it's decor inspiration you're after, the Colourtrend Interior Design Forum showcases the work of seven top interior designers, each of whom has created a stunning room to provide inspiration and ideas about the ways in which colour and décor transforms a home.
Designers here include Abbeyfeale Interior Design, Architectural Spaces, Dan-Eire Designs, Drennan Interiors, Hedge Roe, Rachel Hobbs Designs and Xiu Feng Shui.
Each will be at the show accompanying their room sets and on hand to offer design and colour advice to visitors. Colourtrend staff will also be there to show how to get the perfect finish for your decorating project.
This year's show sees quantity surveyor Patricia Power – familiar to many from RTE's early Room to Improve TV series – providing advice at the Home Interiors and Design Theatre, which is being run in association with House & Home magazine.
House and Home editor Kirstie Mc Dermott will host talks from leading experts throughout the four-day event, on such topics as home makeovers, interior design trends, design and build options, extensions, colour choices, lighting, up-cycling, home storage, building finance and more.
The Mitsubishi Electric Home Advice Theatre is the home of all that smart technology, as well as sustainable energy solutions. It's the place to go for talks about topics such as innovative new heat pumps, energy efficiencies, the importance of design, and how to increase the value of your home. Speakers here include award-winning architect Fergus Flanagan and Leanne O'Donnell of Optimise Design.
There’s a good selection of kitchen companies present at this month’s event too, including Christoff Kitchens, Foxhall Kitchens and Damien Dowd Kitchens, whose work can be seen in situ in the showhouse. Kitchen Space, and DID Electrical will also be present, as will an array of kitchen designers and suppliers, offering all the appliances and accessories needed to kit out a kitchen, from granite worktops to kitchen tables and blinds.
Check out what’s new in bathrooms too with names such as Sonas Bathrooms, Bathrooms 4U and Soaks Bathrooms, which supplies some of the world’s leading brands and offers a 3D design service.
A new innovation at this autumn's show is a Chefs' Live Theatre, run in association with SuperValu. This will see chefs Martin Shanahan and Kevin Dundon, food stylist and cook book writer Sharon Hearne Smith and healthy eating advocate Niall Breslin conducting cooking demonstrations.
Visitors can seal deals here too, with help from title sponsors Permanent TSB which will have staff manning its stand to talk about mortgages and home improvement loans with, offering ‘approvals in principle’ in just 15 minutes.
Still at the business end, make a beeline for the SEAI stand to find out about the money-saving energy grants available, and to the Revenue stand to find out about the Home Renovation Incentive – get it while it lasts, it’s due to go at the end of this year – and the Help to Buy scheme.
It’s all about “helping home owners attain the comfort, lifestyle and wellbeing that comes from achieving their ideal home,” says Sean Lemass of SDL Exhibitions, the show’s organiser.
“The extension and home renovation boom continues across the country and visitors planning such major projects will find all the help and advice they need.”
