Jack Lynch's Rathgar home for sale

Dublin 6/€1.8m: Former taoiseach Jack Lynch's Garville Avenue home is being sold. Rose Doyle reports.

Lisieux, the Dublin home of former taoiseach Jack Lynch, is on the market with Sherry FitzGerald guiding €1.8m prior to auction on May 18th for this executor sale.

Jack and Mairin Lynch bought Lisieux, the gracious 19th century redbrick on Garville Avenue, Rathgar, Dublin 6 which would be their Dublin residence for the rest of the century in 1951. They paid £2,500.

Fifty-four years later the home of the man who would be taoiseach and his wife is back on the market. A two-storey, mid-terrace house built in 1866, Lisieux has two reception rooms, four bedrooms and a floor area of some 186sq m (2,000sq ft).

Jack Lynch, a Corkman and, Eamon de Valera apart, the longest serving leader of the Fianna Fail party, was twice taoiseach and was responsible for bringing Ireland into the European Economic Community. He was parliamentary secretary to the government when he and his wife moved into 21 Garville Avenue in 1953 and gave it the name Lisieux.

Buying into Garville Avenue was something of a homecoming for Mairin Lynch, nee O'Connor, who had lived with her mother in number 51 Garville Avenue before marrying her sportsman/politician husband. (Lynch won six All-Ireland medals in a row).

Jack and Mairin Lynch lived in Liseux for 47 years. Mr Lynch died in 1999. Mrs Lynch died in June 2004. The Lisieux charm, and where its possibilities are best seen since it will need some renovating and modernising, is in the high ceilinged, elegantly L-shaped reception rooms.

Walls of a pale olive colour suit rooms lit by long, sash windows front and rear and help emphasise the white-painted, decorative cornicing and elaborate centre roses in both rooms.

The windows have functioning shutters, and period fireplaces in each of the rooms have beige tile insets and are gas-fired. The double, folding doors between are especially large. The front door and entrance hallway are to the side of the house and give a sense of separateness, and space. The hallway itself is another L-shaped area and has a good-sized walk-in cloakroom.

Rear, descending steps lead to a guest toilet and to a kitchen which would need revamping. It has a range of storage units and a sink by the sash window.

A room which has been added on behind the house could become part of an extended kitchen. The first floor return and landing are given light and character by a large window high in the rear wall. There's symmetry here too in a pair of arches, one leading to the return and a second, more elaborate one, on the landing above.

The return has a bedroom with a small, cast-iron fireplace and shuttered sash window to the side. A bathroom has a shower and hot press.

The other three bedrooms, two to the front and one to rear, are off the first floor landing. All have high ceilings and two have built-in wardrobes.

The Lisieux gardens, front and rear, are a definite plus. To the rear there's 110ft of green - old lawns, a wealth of bush and plant life and a cherry tree giving a burst of colour. A brick garden shed sits alongside a galvanised one and a garage at the end has both vehicular and pedestrian access via a back lane. There is more than enough space to add a mews, subject to planning permission. The front garden is lawned, has a wide pathway and is made private by high hedging.