Survey Data
Reg No
60230072
Rating
National
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Artistic
Original Use
House
In Use As
House
Date
1935 - 1940
Coordinates
321431, 226494
Date Recorded
12/04/2016
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Detached four-bay two-storey flat-roofed house, built 1937; occupied 1939, on a staggered L-shaped plan with single-bay two-storey projecting end bay (south) or single-bay two-storey recessed end bay (north). Flat roof behind parapet with concealed rainwater goods retaining cast-iron hoppers and downpipes. Rendered walls. Square-headed door opening approached by two steps, concealed dressings with cantilevered canopy framing timber panelled double doors. Square-headed flanking window openings with concrete sills, and concealed dressings framing wrought iron panels over fixed-pane fittings. Square-headed window openings with concrete sills, and concealed dressings framing steel casement windows having horizontal glazing bars. Set in landscaped grounds with rendered stepped boundary wall to perimeter having concrete coping.
Appraisal
A house erected by Moore Ffrench Parkhill (d. 1940) on a site leased (1936) from John Fitzpatrick of Knocksinna (see 60230062) representing an important component of the mid twentieth-century domestic built heritage of south County Dublin with the architectural value of the composition, one attributed to Frederick Edward Bradshaw MacManus (1903-85) 'who had designed a house on the Stillorgan Road in 1937 and [whose] description is similar to Fahanmura' (Unger 1998, n.p.), confirmed by such attributes as the staggered plan form off-centred on a canopied doorcase showing Art Deco-like lamp standards; the sheer surface finish; the diminishing in scale of the openings on each floor producing a graduated visual impression with those openings showing characteristic horizontal glazing patterns; and the parapeted flat roof doubling as an occasional sun deck. Having been well maintained, the elementary form and massing survive intact together with substantial quantities of the original fabric, both to the exterior and to the interior, thus upholding the character or integrity of a house forming the unofficial centrepiece of a so-called "International Style suburb" (cf. 60230066 - 60230071; 60230073).