Architect's rebuilt Rathgar redbrick

DUBLIN 6: €2.85M:After a total – and impressive – refurb, the only original thing left in this large villa-style Victorian is the front door, writes ROSE DOYLE

THE STYLISH, architecturally imaginative job of renovation and rebuilding to 70 Orwell Road, Rathgar, Dublin 6 is impressive both in its sweep and its detail.

A large, detached, villa-style Victorian house, the sweep is seen in a rear, two-storey extension where a two-floor wall of windows frame a village view and in a soaring kitchen/breakfastroom where a mezzanine overlooks a ground floor children’s playroom.

The detail is everywhere: in the vast, circular lighting feature over the kitchen island; in the way shallow curves in the return pick up a similar curve over the front door; in the carefully replicated Rostrevor Roses in the centre of 14ft high ceilings; in a ground floor linen cupboard artfully hidden behind a hinged-mirror.

A large 400sq m (4,300sq ft) house with five bedrooms, four reception rooms and private, enclosed rear garden, the asking price is €2.85 million and Savills is looking after the private treaty sale.

Stripped of its period glory and in apartments when the architect owner bought three years ago, the house had to be “hacked back to its origins and started all over again”.

Irish craftspeople and firms were salient: Daingean Joinery replicated the original doors; King Fireplaces of Kildare produced marble, period-style fireplaces for the reception rooms; and Euromould of Kilcock, working piece by painstaking piece, replaced the ornate plasterwork to ceilings and walls.

The front door, according to the owner, “remains the only original thing in the house” but the double set of granite steps leading to it had to be rebuilt.

An “upside-down” house, living/reception areas are on the ground floor and bedrooms at garden level. The full impact of the makeover hits you in the kitchen/breakfastroom where the centre aisle is of polished marble and walnut, and the rear wall of window fills the space with rooftop and church spire views.

A pair of adjoining reception rooms on the other side of the hallway have a graceful, “completely remade”, front bay window which is mirrored by a similar bay in a bedroom underneath.

Two bedrooms share a large en suite with tub-style bath; a third, guest-bedroom, is en suite while the very large, en suite main bedroom overlooks the south-facing rear garden and its Indian sandstone patio.

A playroom on this level also overlooks the garden and is fully and handily viewable from the mezzanine.

The garden’s privacy is made complete by tall trees.

70 Orwell Road, Rathgar, Dublin 6

Refurbished period five-bed with stand-out kitchen and rear extension

Agent: Savills