A three-bedroom former coach house is one of the most unusual London properties to be listed for sale this year
(Picture: John D Wood | Rightmove)From the street it looks like a fairly typical London period home.
Inside, what with its opulent stately home standard plasterwork, stained glass, and depictions of plump, naked cherubs cavorting on the ceiling this house could very well be Britain’s poshest semi.
The three bedroom former coach house, set between Clapham and Wandsworth commons, is one of the most unusual properties to come onto the market in the capital this year. It is for sale with John D Wood & Co with a guide price of £1.45 million to £1.5 million, despite its “unfinished” state, having been first listed for £1.6 million.
“I was absolutely flabbergasted and speechless when I first saw it,” said Kesha Foss-Smith, area director at John D Wood & Co. “It was like walking into a museum or doing a tour of a Grade I listed house.”
The property was originally not a house at all, but a stable block built to provide accommodation for horses and carriages owned by the grand neighbouring mansion, Dudley House. The original cast iron columns which divided the horses’ stabling have survived, as has their Dutch tiled floor.
The stables were built in 1870 and, in 1898, the property’s new owner – James Ryan O’Connor, a wealthy bookmaker and racehorse trainer — decided to add a lavishly decorated billiard room above them.
Its walls are decorated with hand painted murals of hunting scenes, and of children, thought to depict members of the Ryan O’Connor family, playing cricket and football. The cherubs are picked out in a ceiling frieze.
After O’Connor, all but bankrupted by a lifetime of gambling, sold Dudley House it was used as a day nursery before it was converted into flats. His stable block and billiard room became a separate house which is Grade II listed thanks to its lavish Baroque décor.
The house currently has an “upside down” layout with two bedrooms and a study on the ground floor, and the third bedroom, kitchen, and 28ft long living room with towering 13 ft high ceilings above.
As well as maximalist taste its future owner will need deep pockets to renovate the house. “It needs everything doing to it,” said Foss-Smith.
“The layout is a bit higgledy-piggledy too. “But the people who are looking at it are people who are looking for something really unique, and they are prepared to rethink it.”
