Most prominent Victorian on Rathgar terrace for €1.7m

Fairfield Park, at the Rathgar end of Highfield Road is a very private railed rectangle of green maintained by the council and flanked by period redbricks on two sides.

Number 1 is situated parallel to Highfield Road and is the largest of the seven properties on this terrace.

The house dates from the 1880s and belonged to the builder of the terrace who kept the best site for himself. The house sits on a third of an acre and like many Victorian houses is bigger than it looks.

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There are fine period features throughout, starting with Art Nouveau glass panels in the front door which opens into a hall with ceiling heights of almost 14 feet.

The two interconnecting reception rooms are to the right and overlook the park from the big bay window in the drawing room. Decorated in colours picked up in a Dutch tapestry on one of the walls, the rooms have matching fireplaces and a set of fold-back doors.

Large celebrations

The kitchen is on the hall return. Designed by Co Offaly-based Dermot Bracken and featuring a racing green four-door Aga, it was installed in 2008 when the owners also rewired and replumbed the house. Off it is a laundry room that helps keep ambient noise to a minimum.

Adjoining the cooking area is a living room with double doors opening out to a raised timber deck. From here you can take in the garden which is home to apple, pear and plum trees.

A marquee here has hosted 21st parties and other large celebrations on more than one occasion. Wedge-shaped, the garden measures 152ft /46m long and averages 58ft/17m in width. There is vehicular rear access.

On the hall return a room used as a study could make a fifth bedroom. There are two more bedrooms on the first floor. To the front, the master bedroom spans the width of the house and overlooks the park.

The owners added a shower en-suite bathroom – a boon for this room but it has compromised the proportions of the other double bedroom on this floor. A fourth bedroom is on the first-floor return.

Converted

A room in the attic, which was converted before the current owners moved here in the early 1990s, is lit by a rooflight, has a walk-in wardrobe and more storage in the eaves.

To the right of the main house there is a one-bedroom, one-storey mews that was built in 1992 with vehicular access from a nearby lane.

The property is asking €1.795 million through agent SherryFitzGerald. According to the Property Price Register number 14, another five-bed property, came to market asking €1.1 million last September and sold for close to that.

Number 8, also a five-bed, has just sold for near its €1.1 million asking price. Number 2 sold for €1.5 million in August 2014 having come to the market asking €1.2 million that April.