For Pet's Sake

A former council house is given an architect’s touch with an aquarium annex built to house a special pet, a 13 year old snapping turtle.

- PENNY CRAWFORD-COLLINS.

When Marc Kenny bought this former 1940s council house in 2003 it was in a bad state of disrepair, it was basically just four walls and a roof, the front door was nailed shut and the garden was completely overgrown. ‘I wanted to stay in Dun Laoghaire, it’s a Borough I’d grown up in and this property provided me with an affordable opportunity to do so,’ explains Marc.

On a tight budget, Marc stayed with his parents, and embarked on the project himself, using his weekends and evenings, painstakingly renovating the property, which required re-plumbing, re-wiring along with new windows, new doors, and floors. The unusual front porch was added by Marc. A salvage lover, he bought the Victorian Methodist church porch on eBay and resized it to fit the house.