The Best Days
In The Super Seven Towns and Villages of West Waterford (2024), James Hyde describes the “glittering necklace” of Aglish, Ballyduff, Cappoquin, Lismore, Mount Mellerey, Tallow and Villierstown. “Cappoquin is a friendly business town located where the River Blackwater turns south. For decades it saw boats and paddle steamers plying their trade to the Irish Sea at Youghal, and bringing people upriver for days out and sports matches.” The crown jewel in this pretty village is Cappoquin House.
The Big House in Ireland is usually hidden away behind high stone walls, locked gates and a wooded demesne. Notable exceptions are Castletown Cox (Piltown, County Kilkenny), Lismore Castle (Lismore, County Waterford, visible despite being set in a 3,240 hectare estate), and Rosemount House (New Ross, County Wexford) which are all distractingly visible from public roads. Cappoquin House firmly fits into the latter category: not many country houses have an address on Main Street. It rises high above the whole town, closer to heaven physically and visually that any of the nearby buildings.
An Introduction to the Architectural Heritage of County Waterford by the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage (2010) states, “The late 18th century Cappoquin House (1779), home of the Keane family, was burnt in 1923 but was reconstructed with great care to designs by Richard Orpen (1863 to 1938), brother of the more famous society painter William (1878 to 1931). The by then conservative aesthetic in which Cappoquin was rebuilt underlined the cautious approach to architecture that more or less dominated the century.”
There are a lot of plants to see for an honesty box €6 entrance fee. Current owner Sir Charles Keane’s mother Lady Olivia Keane revamped the 19th century gardens in the 1950s and then expanded them two decades later. Due to the steep gradient, the town is invisible from the house and garden, and instead the uninterrupted view is across the tidal valley of the River Blackwater as it gains momentum en route to the sea at Youghal. Rambling Rector climbing rose drapes over the verandah; Golden Showers climbing rose wraps round the courtyard.
“My mother began to develop the grounds more vigorously and she had a great concept of design,” says Sir Charles who lives in the house with his wife Lady Corinne. “She planted well with an instinct for what looks right – and that’s key. The aim, really, is beauty. If you are on a slope you must keep open to the view which means we’re always cutting back.” His ancestor, solicitor John Keane, bought the property 290 years ago. The Keanes are descendants of the O’Cahans of County Londonderry who lost their lands in the Plantation of Ulster. Ah, the nuances of Anglo Irish and British and Irish and West British lineage.
“The country houses of politicians became a regular target during the Civil War that followed Irish Independence,” Sir Charles relates, “so when my grandfather Sir John Keane was elected to the Senate in the new Irish Free State, he anticipated an attack. With considerable foresight he removed the contents and many of the fixtures, and placed them in storage. It transpired that his premonition was well founded and the house was duly burnt. But by the 1930s he felt sufficiently confident to rebuild with the advice of Richard Orpen. In the ensuing remodelling the façade became the garden front while the north front facing the courtyard became the entrance front.” Before the era of Éamon de Valera as Taoiseach, the Irish Free State Government provided compensation to country house owners who had their properties destroyed in the Civil War. Most chose not to rebuild. The shadowy veil of picnickers in a foreign land would sadly prevail down the generations.
Cappoquin House and gardens are in fact a 20th century creation or recreation. The real Phoenix Park. There’s a tantalising approach to the house: it appears in long distance views only to vanish above the town; a steep avenue off Main Street leads to the stable block which offers the first glimpse of the house framed by an archway. Names mentioned in connection with the original 1779 house are John Roberts of Waterford or the better known Sardinia born Davis Ducart. John Roberts designed the simply elegant Gaultier Lodge in Woodstown, 73 kilometres east of Cappoquin. But there is more of Cappoquin House to be found in the refined Italianate neoclassicism of Castletown Cox, a Davis Ducart designed country house 226 kilometres north of Cappoquin. Both share a seven bay elevation with three bay breakfront and s scattering of arch headed windows.
The Keane residence is a two storey building constructed of smooth grey limestone. A flat roof behind a parapet dotted with finials is centred on a circular lantern over the staircase hall. A seven bay south elevation with a three bay breakfront overlooks the Sunken Garden and far below, the Blackwater River. The breakfront of the corresponding north elevation has two first floor bays above a three bay entrance arrangement treated as a two dimensional portico: Doric columns flank the partially glazed front door and pilasters end said arrangement. The north elevation is slightly shorter than the south elevation due to the projections on the east and west elevations. It faces the courtyard and the Upper Pleasure Garden. A verandah is attached to the three bay projection to one side of the six bay west elevation facing the Croquet Lawn. This ivy clad front resembles Mount Stewart in Greyabbey, County Down. A neoclassical conservatory projects from the six bay east front: a lower earlier wing extends from the three bay projection. The east front is plainer than the rest of the exterior with no window surrounds and overlooks the Wing Garden.
