This year’s Spring Permanent TSB Ideal Home Show is all about wellbeing: yours, your family’s and the planet’s.
It’s about “helping home owners attain the comfort, lifestyle and wellbeing that comes from achieving your ideal home,” says Sean Lemass of SDL Exhibitions, the event organisers.
Up to 30,000 people are expected to attend the show, which takes place from April 12th to 14th at Dublin's RDS.
The focus on sustainability and personal wellbeing is evidenced by the introduction of Eco Expo, a specialised section dedicated to demonstrating the ways in which home owners can reduce their energy bills, and extend or improve their homes in an eco-friendly way.
[Register here before Saturday, April 6th, for your free admission ticket for two people to the Ideal Home Show]
The showhouse, built on site, is always a central element of the show. This season, which is sponsored by home appliance innovator Dyson, puts the emphasis firmly on environmental friendliness.
Visiting Ireland’s best loved home improvements show will give you the ideas and the inspiration you need to turn your home into the stylish, comfortable and welcoming living space that you can be proud of.
The Dyson Wellbeing Showhouse is a contemporary family home designed by Rebecca Roe of interiors specialist Hedgeroe Home, which marries striking interior design with eco-friendly and wellbeing technologies. Roe's vision succeeds in bringing indoor and outdoor together to create a place of harmony and calmness for the perfect place to retreat and recharge.
It makes particularly good use of natural light, with magnificent glass panels surrounding an indoor atrium, in a design that draws inspiration from traditional Japanese tea rooms, with earthy tones and natural yarns chosen to promote sustainability and wellbeing.
The showhouse puts a premium on the thousands of litres of air that we breathe daily. Given that the vast majority of our breathing is done indoors, improving our air quality makes sense. Dyson's innovative technologies – across floorcare, air purification, lighting and even haircare – are designed to boost wellbeing. Dyson's engineers have developed intelligent home technologies to make floors and indoor air cleaner. For example, its newest cord-free vacuum cleaners remove 99.97 per cent of particles, including dust and allergens as small as 0.3 microns, from our homes*.
Its highly-efficient purification machines clean the air around us throughout the day.
In fact, improving air quality indoors becomes all the more important given the increased efficiency of modern insulation solutions.
While new homes today are created to top-notch insulation standards, those living in older homes, and those keen to upgrade their home’s energy efficiency, will find myriad ways to boost their home’s energy efficiency at the show.
Grants
They can also consult with staff at the SEAI (Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland) about the range of Home Energy Grants available to help.
Find out more about sustainability and wellbeing at the show's Mitsubishi Electric Home Advice Theatre
Improving your BER (Base Emission Rate) will add value to your property, but these amendments will not just save money on heating costs, also improving your warmth and wellbeing. More than 400,000 homes in Ireland have already availed of home energy grants, which range in value from €400 for attic insulation to €700 for upgrades to heating controls, through to €6,000 for external wall insulation.
For those looking for a heat pump system, a grant of €3,500 is available. Mitsubishi, a market leader in this area, will have its Ecodan Air Source Heat Pump at the Mitsubishi Electric stand. Heat pumps are an environmentally friendly way to heat your home, and your water, while also reducing CO2 emissions and energy bills. Find out more about sustainability and wellbeing at the show's Mitsubishi Electric Home Advice Theatre, a great source of information about sustainable energy and technology for anyone looking to extend, renovate or build.
Free advice
While for many visitors the opportunity to see new products and innovative solutions is a key part of the show’s appeal, for others it’s the opportunity to get free advice from exhibitors and seminar speakers, all under one roof.
- At the Garden Advice Clinic, run by Michael O'Reilly from The Garden Shop in Belfast, visitors can book a 15-minute slot and bring pictures of their gardens, to help them scope out fresh ideas.
- Architect Peter Crowley and interior designer Deirdre Whelan, familiar to many from their role as judges on RTE's Home of the Year show, will be around to provide tips for those considering extension or renovation projects.
- Patricia Power, the quantity surveyor best known for her work on RTÉ's Room to Improve, will be returning to the House and Home Interiors & Design Theatre, with advice to help maximise value and save money when undertaking a home improvement project.
- The theatre, which is hosted by House and Home magazine's Kirstie Mc Dermott, is part of the Show's Home Interiors Fair and attracts some of the best known interior designers and industry experts in the country for both informative panel discussions and free one-on-one advice sessions.It covers everything from home makeovers to interior design trends, colour choices, lighting and up-cycling.
The show allows you put your ideas into action too, thanks to the presence of exhibitors such as Diamond Furniture, Des Kelly Interiors, Fineline Furniture, Material World and Matt Britton Carpets. At this season's show, "At Home With Arnotts" is a major new installation offering fully furnished room sets for living, dining and bedrooms. Your finance for these projects can be sorted as staff from headline sponsor Permanent TSB will be on hand to walk you through mortgage, home improvement loans and home insurance, with 15 minute "approval in principle" for home improvement loans available at their stand. In addition, Revenue will be there too, answering questions about the Help to Buy Scheme for first-time buyers.
All in all, it’s the "ideal" way to give you, your home and the environment a wellbeing boost.
* Dyson cyclone V10. Tested against EN 60312-1 5.11. Tested in MAX mode.
[ Register here before Saturday, April 6th,Opens in new window ]
The Permanent TSB Ideal Home Show returns to the RDS Simmonscourt from April 12th to 14th.
