Room to Improve couple thrilled with their new Kildalkey home
Viewers across the country were glued to their TV sets on Sunday night as an old Kildalkey farmhouse was transformed into a dream home.
The highly popular RTE programme 'Room to Improve' has a huge following nationwide, but Sunday night's episode gripped the country as Meath couple, David Arkins and Celine Smyth saw Celine's grandmothers home transformed into a wonderful modern living space while retaining the traditional facade of a rural farmhouse.
The couple who are getting married later this year, are the fourth generation to live there and retaining the charm and character of the old place was a major concern for the whole family.
Just one room deep, cold, cramped and hopelessly outdated, the farmhouse was too small to renovate on its own, so architect Dermot Bannon, designed a single story extension within the footprint of a cow barn attached to the gable wall - and the result was stunning.
Celine's ancestors have lived in the house at Cois Surthan, Ballybrittas, Kildalkey since 1906 and Celine's grandmother, Peggy Reilly lived there until four years ago, when she moved in with Celine's parents who live next door.
Celine is a teacher in St Paul's National School in Ratoath and David is a sound engineer who runs Crookedwood Recording studios in Slane and is a son of renowned musician, Charle Arkins.
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The couple had been living in an apartment in Navan when they decided to see if they could convert the old house.
'We always talked about living in the country. The house had been empty for four years, but we never imagined we could do anything with it.
'Once we mentioned renovating it, everyone was delighted at the idea but we couldn't have done it, if it hadn't been for room to Improve and Dermot Bannon.
'We sent off an application with a few pictures and they came back to us to say they wanted to do it,' David explains.
With a wedding on the horizon - they plan to get married on 30th December next - and no contingency in the budget, the build quickly ran into problems when the cost of replacing an old chimney breast added thousands to the cost and contractors Edward Brothers discovered a major problem with the drains and septic tank.
'There is no way, we would have been able to do it to this standard is it wasn't for Dermot and the contractors.'
They preserved the facade of the original house and used the cowshed as an extension.
The building and cowshed were gutted and inside Dermot created a huge open plan living space, but preserved the old parlour within it. Also downstairs is a seperate den/TV room and the master bedroom. There are two upstairs bedrooms.
'The builders were great. Anything they could do for free they did it. We couldn't have managed without them.
'Dermot was wonderful and we are delighted with his design.'
During the show there was considerable controversy over a tiny window Dermot had on the drawings - which the couple believed may have been a mistake.
Dermot however insisted it was an integral part of the design and David now says that if someone offered to replace it for free, he wouldn't let them - he loves what he called 'the Hobbit window'.
'We are absolutely delighted with the house. Celine's parents and mine are thrilled and most importantly, Peggy, Celine's grandmother loves it. It all worked out really well,' David says.