CountryLiving: A romantic Georgian house on 95 acres with views of the Sugarloaf is available to rent, writes Kate McMorrow.
People looking for a status home to rent in a country location - yet convenient to the city - could take a look at Derrybawn, a romantic Georgian house in the Wicklow hills with seven en suite bedrooms and 95 acres.
There is also a cute little one-bedroom vaulted mews cottage for guests. Luxuriously furnished, Derrybawn is currently available at €10,000 per month through Hassett Estate Agents in Greystones where Caroline Shannon is handling enquiries.
The main house is at the end of a long winding driveway, a few minutes walk from the village of Laragh, beloved of hill-walkers and reachable from the city. Derrybawn will be remembered by many as an upmarket guest house in the 1990s.
The owners, paid around £2 million in 2001 for the 929 sq m (10,000 sq ft) period house. Although in reasonable order then, the couple embarked on an extensive refurbishment programme, sparing nothing in the process. Magnificent decorative plasterwork was brought back, timbers polished and the entire was lavishly re-decorated.
The baronial splendour of Derrybawn has to be seen first-hand, if only to appreciate the way mountain views are framed through tall Georgian windows. Formal rooms are painted in singing Mediterranean colours of tangerine and crimson, with cream walls in the main salon creating a restful look.
The house is cream painted to the front, with an ancient wisteria promising a splash of colour come summer. From the stone-clad rear, the view sweeps down stone steps to manicured parkland and forest, with the Sugarloaf in the background.
Each room in the house has its own theme, from traditional to quirky, with one particularly racy bedroom sporting a leather bed with antlers.
Residents will also have the use of a games room, sauna, wine cellar and a grounds man to keep an eye on things. The grounds are both formal and wild, with a stretch of the Glenaloe River running through, thick woods and 18 acres of parkland, across which deer occasionally stroll.
