A secluded semi-detached Victorian house on Sandymount Avenue, Dublin 4, which has four bedrooms and a garden of some botanical splendour, is expected to make around £400,000 when it is auctioned by Cumisky Cooke & Scales on June 29th. Built in the early l860's, Number 17 Sandymount Avenue has two entrances. One of these is a short, leafy avenue, which leads to a gravelled parking area with a pair of carriage lamps which originally lit the streets of Rathmines at the turn of the century. Dense hedging effectively screens the house from its neighbour.
The front door leads into a generously sized reception hallway with polished parquet flooring. Bookshelves have been fitted under one of two windows which overlook the garden. The kitchen/family room is off this hallway to the left. The family area, formerly a garage but converted in the early l980s, ends in a bay window with built-in seating and garden views. The kitchen area has fitted wooden units and walls tiled in a dark red. The drawing room is to the right of the hall. Divided by a pair of central arches, it has a mahogany surround fireplace with cast-iron and tiled inset. Bookshelves have been built into what was once a door; there are three windows in one wall and a deep bay window in another with more garden views. Also off the reception hallway is a shower room. Next to this, steps lead down to a study where the low ceiling and single window look on to a small, high-walled rear yard, giving it a definite Victorian feel. A narrow, rear pantry /utility room opens into this yard.
There is a smallish bedroom on the first floor return and, off the main landing on the first floor proper, three more bedrooms. The main bedroom, which has fitted wardrobes and a wash-hand basin, has a bay window to the front. A second bedroom has a wash-hand basin and hot press and the third has windows to the side and front. All four bedrooms share a family bathroom. The paved, enclosed and carefully tended garden has an ornamental pond with fish and newts to which a heron is a regular visitor. It is surrounded by fragrant roses, jasmine and lavender and by climbers which include honeysuckle, ivy and a white flowering solanum.
Given its period feel and unique privacy just a couple of minutes walk from the RDS in Ballsbridge, it could make considerably more than the guide price under the hammer.
