Years ago the owner of Copper Beech House, a solid, spacious energy-efficient house outside Kilcock, Co Kildare, met the late, legendary jockey and trainer Lester Piggott at a Curragh race meeting: “He wouldn’t believe that I was named after him. I had to run off and find my dad, who told him I was indeed called after him, and then Lester Piggott then shook my hand,” recalls Lester Cassidy.
Equestrian interests run through Cassidy’s family: two of his uncles are a trainer and bookie respectively, and though he gave bookmaking a go, it wasn’t for him and he took up carpentry as an apprentice in his teens. At the age of just 19, while working on a roof, the scaffolding collapsed beneath him, causing him to fall and break his spine; he has used a wheelchair ever since.
Rachel, his then girlfriend and now wife, designed their home outside Kilcock with Lester, and the couple engaged Brian Connolly & Associates to bring their plans to fruition.
It was built in 2005 and lies at the end of a spectacular copper beech-lined driveway that gives it its name. The property, inside electrically controlled gates, is surrounded by 24 acres outside its mature gardens, providing a private equestrian facility just 35km from Dublin.
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It extends to a considerable 557sq m (6,000sq ft), clad in warm cut sandstone from We Sell Stone in Roscrea. It has four bedrooms, a sunroom, an office, a large kitchen and a big snooker room, which is Lester’s favourite space – not just for the full-size snooker table but for the fact that it lends itself to entertaining.
The family have entertained in their B1-rated home quite a bit over the years, including for their wedding, for which they seated 400 guests in a marquee on the grounds. They also added surround-sound internally and externally in a courtyard space accessed from reception rooms and, considering the private bucolic setting, can play music as loud as their hearts desire.
Equestrian facilities on the grounds include 17 stables (an 18th was converted to a kitchen and shower), a lunging ring, a five-bay horse walker and a machinery shed. It also has a five-furlong gallop, and three grass paddocks inside the all-important post and rail fencing. “The circle at the end of the gallop is three furlongs, so you don’t have to go to the Curragh to do fast work,” says Lester.
They are selling for a number of reasons. The two uncles who trained horses here for years are retiring, and Lester was recently diagnosed with and treated for a brain tumour. “Though I looked like Frankenstein after the surgery, I really consider myself a lucky guy. It turns out it only affects one in a million and the fact that it grew out of my skull and not into my brain was just pure luck,” he says. The estate is now too much for him and his dad, who has assisted over the years, so the family are downsizing locally from their “little slice of heaven”.
As Copper Beech House was designed with Lester in mind, every room is wheelchair accessible. It also has a lift and expensive features such as a Jacuzzi bath, bespoke joinery, marble and oak flooring and a double 500sq ft garage.
And if the large gardens and 24 acres of equestrian facilities aren’t enough for new owners’ walking needs, nearby Donadea Forest Park has three looped hiking trails.
Lester, who raised €150,000 last May for Spinal Injuries Ireland and the National Rehabilitation Hospital when he climbed Croagh Patrick in a specially adapted buggy, will miss his home and neighbours, and along with Rachel, has placed their impressive home on the market through Coonan Property, seeking €1.475 million.
