The narrative of the Irish country house as a place of dishevelment and decay has a long and melancholic history, stretching back to the publication of Maria Edgeworth’s seminal novel Castle Rackrent in 1800. Her vision of properties and their owners both being hopelessly atrophied found many fictional heirs for almost two centuries, continuing as late as Caroline Blackwood’s Great Granny Webster, which appeared in 1977 and Molly Keane’s Good Behaviour published four years later. These accounts present variations on the same theme: that the Irish country house, dank, gloomy and bitterly cold, has no viable future and is doomed to sink into ruin. In truth, the notion of the Big House – as such buildings are traditionally known in Ireland – being in terminal decline frequently had its basis in fact. In March 1912, Violet Martin, one half of the writing duo Somerville and Ross, informed her c0-author Edith Somerville about a recent visit to Tyrone House, County Galway which she found ‘rather dilapidated and ‘where rioted three or four generations of St. Georges – living with country-women, occasionally marrying them, all illegitimate four times over. No so long ago eight of these awful half-peasant families roosted together in that lovely house, and fought, and barricaded and drank, till the police had to intervene.’ Tyrone House duly served as the inspiration for Somerville and Ross’s 1925 novel, The Big House of Inver.

Fortunately, in recent decades there have been other, and happier, stories deserving to be told, as will be discovered in The Irish Country House: A New Vision. The fifteen houses featured offer an alternative narrative, not just about historic Irish properties but about Ireland herself. Once dogged by persistent poverty and a pervasive atmosphere of dejection, since the 1990s the country has undergone something of a transformation. This change of circumstances has brought with it fresh opportunities and the promise of a better future for Irish country houses. Formerly, the sale and abandonment of big old properties was a common occurrence, but this is no longer the only or even most frequent option. Instead, the possibility of a new life has become viable. Which is not to suggest that every historic house can be assured of a secure future; there are still buildings being lost, like so many of their equivalents in the past. But the chances of salvation are now much better than used to be the case.

Almost all the properties featured in The Irish Country House: A New Vision have had to undergo extensive restoration since the start of the present century, some of them are still in the process of being restored. Had they not been acquired or inherited by the present generation of owners it is probable that at least some of them would have been lost forever.
It takes a particular kind of pluck, or perhaps madness, to assume responsibility for a house much larger than the average family home, and constructed in an era when staff to maintain the building were plentiful and cheap. Fortunately, there are people gifted with this kind of pluck, along with generous quantities of imagination and determination. These traits are particularly necessary when the house in question is currently in poor condition, sometimes even downright ruinous. Not everyone possesses the character required for the task, just as not everyone wants to take on the challenge of bringing an old house back to life. Providentially, Ireland is blessed that there are increasing numbers of them who relish the opportunity, with all its potential highs and lows. Some of them feature in the book, but there are many more who are at different stages of the journey towards the creation of a viable, comfortable family home. The hazards of taking on an historic house are obvious, cost being just one of them. But there are advantages too, not least the chance to put your own stamp on a building. Along with installing new plumbing and electric wiring, with repairing gutters and replacing damaged windows, comes the possibility of further enhancing the character of a place, of adding another distinctive chapter to its story. This is what sets apart these properties. They disprove the long-standing narrative of the Irish country house as being in irremediable decline and instead inform us that these buildings have been blessed with an irresistible and dynamic new spirit.

The Irish Country House: A New Vision is published by Rizzoli