Waltham Terrace is a wide leafy road off Mount Merrion Avenue in Blackrock, Co Dublin. It is one of the more uniquely preserved roads of early Victorian houses in the capital. Most houses were built in the earlier half of the last century - although there is a more modern stretch of houses at one end - and though their designs vary, all have generous proportions, good gardens, and mature trees.
Houses on Waltham Terrace don't often come on the market, so Number 7 should excite interest. The house, which is for sale by private treaty through The Phillips Partnership, has a guide price of £750,000. The 2,400 sq ft semi-detached house has four bedrooms, three reception rooms, a walled garden to the rear and a fine sense of its period pedigree throughout. The current owner, who bought the house in 1989 for £240,000 has, with due consideration to its origins, extensively refurbished and updated fundamentals such as wiring and plumbing.
The front door is to the side and is reached across a gravelled front with off-street parking and a mimosa tree. A door leads from the entrance lobby to a guest bathroom with wash-hand basin, lavatory, bath and small window on to the rear garden. The hallway is right-angled to the entrance lobby. High ceilinged and bright, it leads through the house to the stairs and beyond them to the kitchen.
On the left of the hall is a comfortable study with two windows and a double glass door looking out over the rear garden. The fact of it being a step lower than the hallway gives an added sense of privacy. The living-room is opposite, with windows to the front and side of the house and polished timber floor. The original fireplace is intact and functioning and has a painted wood surround with a highly decorative tile inset.
The dining-room has a similar fireplace, this one with even more elaborately decorative tiling inset. Here, too, the floor is of polished timber while a window to the front has its original shutters.
At the end of the hallway is an old-style kitchen with working, gas-fired Aga cooker. There are presses at both floor and wall level and there is spring water on tap from a private well behind the house. Beyond the kitchen is a long narrow utility room and there is also a galley-style store room. The stairwell is filled with light from a high, Velux window. Upstairs, the main bedroom is a large sunny room with windows to the front and side and a full en suite bathroom. There are built-in wardrobes and the rose-bud carpet and curtains will be included in the sale.
A second, smaller bedroom has a window over the garden, built-in shelves and a wardrobe. The third bedroom has an original fireplace, windows to the side and back and a cloakroom off it - and given that it is plumbed and already has a wash-hand basin, it would easily make the conversion to an en suite. It overlooks the feathery leaves of the mimosa tree at the front of the house. A separate bathroom has a bath with shower fitting, bidet, lavatory and recessed wash-hand basin. A patio runs along the rear of the house and blends nicely with the granite-walled garden. The extensive grounds of the Sacred Heart Mission lie to the other side of the wall and, with trees, ensure privacy.
