Olde curiosity stop in Meath –collector’s home seeks new owner with grá for Irish history

Former teacher Oliver Burns sought out the right house to show off his extensive collection of antiques and curios Oliver Burns sitting in front of his inglenook fireplace The inglenook fireplace with crane Home owner Oliver Burns The front of Garry’s Corner in the heart of Kildalkey, Co Meath The kitchen An aerial view of the property The entrance hall The living room One of the three bedrooms One of the stone outbuildings Garry’s Corner, Kildalkey, Co Meath Asking price: €385,000 Agent: Real Estate Alliance: TE Potterton (046) 9431391 For most of us, the attic is where we put all the stuff we’ve collected over a lifetime. The stuff we no longer want in our main living spaces, but are reluctant to throw out. But it’s the very opposite for retired history teacher Oliver Burns. “I made a promise to myself,” says Burns, “that if I get the right house, I wasn’t going to store anything in the attic – if my furniture didn’t fit into the house I was going to sell the surplus. "There is nothing in the attics at all. But this house allowed me, because of the big floor space, to display everything I have and to enjoy it.” Hoarders and antique hunters may find themselves irresistibly drawn to the museum-like interior of Burns’s home, which he has, over the years, made into a means of displaying his extensive collection of old Irish vernacular furnishings and folk history curios. The house in question is Garry’s Corner, a vernacular farmhouse built around 1798 which sits on half an acre in Kildalkey village in Co Meath. The front of Garry’s Corner in the heart of Kildalkey, Co Meath For Burns – an early retiree from second-level history teaching who continues to work as a swimming instructor after 45 years – the house represents a meeting point for his professional passion for history and his personal love of collecting. “I was on the lookout for an old house and also, I have Meath connections,” he says. Garry’s Corner has an impressive yet humble frontage, with a distinct Georgian geometry. Inside there are three bedrooms and two bathrooms with a total of 1,700 sq ft accommodation or thereabouts. There is half an acre of garden with outbuildings, rear access and off-street parking. On the ground floor is an entrance hall, dining room with an open fire, country-style kitchen with an oil-fired Aga cooker, living room and bathroom. The living room has an inglenook fireplace with a crane – a detail that would have changed little since the house was built. The inglenook fireplace with crane When Burns bought the property in 2019, he was still teaching at a secondary school in the capital and needed to stay within an hour’s commute. Kildalkey fit the bill while offering something much more valuable – the chance to house his growing collection in an appropriately aged setting. “I had old bits and pieces already collected myself, so I wanted them to look well in an old shell. I had modern houses before that in Summerhill and in Ashbourne, and the old things were in the new houses. But in an old house, they look even better,” he says. Burns’s collection has grown from three distinct sources over the years. A relation who downsized several times contributed family pieces, auction houses provided other treasures, and then there were the unexpected bonuses from his teaching career. “In the convent school where I was teaching for over 30 years, the sisters were always chopping and changing buildings, refurbishing and knocking down, so I was in the right place at the right time.” When he bought Garry’s Corner, Burns increased his collection overnight, as the house came with its own assemblage of original vernacular furniture left by the previous owners. “There was quite a collection in the house, including an old settle bed,” he says. Among his most prized possessions are two pieces in the front dining room. “There’s a square piano in the front room that was a gift to me from a neighbour where we lived over in Castleknock. It’s a very old piece,” Burns says. The living room The square piano holds particular significance – dating to 1805 with a hand-painted mainboard, it’s a rare mahogany piece that Oliver treasures. There’s also a 19th-century library or smoker’s chair, which he obtained courtesy of his former school. But for all his love of the house, Burns is moving on to satisfy his desire to refurbish one more home. “I want another challenge. Another project, And I feel like I have one more project in me. I’d like to try what I did in Kildalkey somewhere else.” The experience of breathing new life into Garry’s Corner as its custodian has, Burns says, given him the taste for restoration work. Having previously owned only modern houses, this project introduced him to the particular pleasures and challenges of working with a period property. “I realised I gained a lot of experience because the other houses I had were all modern houses.” One of the stone outbuildings His next move will likely take him further from Dublin. “I would like to go further out – and further out generally means cheaper,” he says. The story of Garry’s Corner reads like something from one of Burns’s history lessons. Built around 1795 when Father John Rickard was Kildalkey’s parish priest, the house is deeply connected with the life of the village. In the depths of the penal times, Rickard leased fields from landlord James Nangle, who lived in what is now the Parochial House. During the Great Famine, Rickard used the back kitchen as a makeshift famine relief centre, with many locals reputedly taking shelter in the attic and on the cobbled kitchen floor. The fireplace and crane are from that period. The kitchen The property passed through the Rickard family before coming to the Garrys, who gave the house its name. “The house is part of the streetscape and has been there longer than anything else that’s there now,” Burns says. “I think it’s important for somebody to buy it who would have the same grá for Irish history.” What Burns will miss most, though, is the community. “It’s my neighbours that I got to know, and I really mean that because I made great friends here. There is one particular neighbour who looks after me very well in terms of our home produce – everything from free range eggs, to rhubarb, to jam and chutneys. That’s something I’ll miss.” One of the three bedrooms The village sits between Trim and Navan. “It’s not over developed. All the developments have gone to Trim and Navan, and therefore the village has kept its typical character. It’s rural without being isolated,” he says. For Burns, moving represents both an ending and a beginning. His stewardship of Garry’s Corner has, he says, helped preserve an important piece of Kildalkey’s history, while allowing him to display and enjoy his lifetime’s collection of treasures, leaving the ancient attic to the memory of those poor souls who might have taken shelter there during penal times. Garry’s Corner has an asking price of €385,000 with REA.