Modern mews shaped by architect

A modern mews house in Rathmines, Dublin 6, is set to make over £240,000 at a Sherry FitzGerald auction on March 16th. A two-bedroom house, 28 Charleville Close (and its neighbour, Number 30) was built on a site in a long back garden so the resulting home is deliberately discreet with two storeys to the front and one to the back giving the occupier and neighbours a sense of privacy.

Designed by architect Peter Cassidy for himself, the house makes clever use of the narrow site.

It is open plan, with split levels and huge French windows to the rear giving a sense of light and space. The house is designed around four major themes: white, on all the walls; timber, in the form of a sloping tongue-and-groove wooden ceiling; black, in the specially commissioned off-centre fireplace and kitchen worktop; and pale green, expressed in the large Italian tiles on the downstairs floor.

The dining and living areas share the same ground-floor space, while the latter juts out further into the garden allowing each of the two areas to be defined. The ceilings here incorporate low-voltage down-lighters.

The kitchen, off the dining-room, is at a lower level. The architect brought a passion for food and entertaining guests back from Italy and this influenced the design. An adult standing at the kitchen counter-top is at the same eye level as someone seated at the dining table, allowing conversation to continue while dinner is being prepared.

The specially designed kitchen is in beech and incorporates a built-in table for informal dining.

A tapered gallery on the first floor overlooks the sitting-room. Shelves and a desk here create an office space from which you can see over into the sitting-room. "I think it is because architects are so used to seeing buildings on plan," says Peter Cassidy. "We like to see spaces from above."

A roof light above the stairs and the patio doors bring light in to this area. The neighbouring, white tiled bathroom on the first floor also has a roof-light and a window on to the gallery letting natural light flow into the room.

The double and single bedrooms inter-link to make the most of the available space. The entrance to the double bedroom is narrow allowing the single bedroom a recess to put shelves into. A large mirrored wardrobe makes this part of the double room seem bigger.

The attic, in keeping with the judicious use of space, provides a storage area accessed by a fold-down ladder.

Downstairs the large French windows spanning the rear of the house open out on to a tiled patio that steps down to a lawn with an apple tree. The building of the house, which was completed two years ago, was a happy experience for Mr Cassidy. He got on so well with his builder that the pair went on to construct a home for the builder and now, bitten by the bug, the duo are to create a new home for the architect outside Dublin.