Innovative thinking could give Loman’s new future – Wallace

The attractive and now-empty St Loman’s hospital in Mullingar could provide several couples with larger-than-average homes at a less-than-average price, one of Ireland’s best-known architects has suggested.

Hugh Wallace – known for his role in The Great House Revival, and the Home of the Year – said Ireland should look to the example of other countries where, commonly, a co-operative approach to restoration and subdivision of large re-purposed buildings is taken.

And, he told the Westmeath Examiner this week, the St Loman’s building was ideal for such a project, as were two former convents currently on sale, one in Roscrea and one in Sligo.

“That could make an amazing apartment scheme,” Mr Wallace said of St Loman’s, adding that, realistically, it was the only way the future of the building could be secured.

While currently it is host to a Covid-19 testing centre, he dismissed as unlikely any notion that it would become a hotel or even a university,

However, Mr Wallace admitted, Ireland needs to change the way it views such projects, and it needs to introduce rule changes to let this sort of development proceed.

Mr Wallace’s comments came as he commended the three people who spent €900,000 on the purchase of the 37,000 sq ft Middleton Park House at Castletown Geoghegan, which featured in last Sunday week’s ‘Great House Revival’ episode.

“I think an interesting thing about this house is eight people could have bought it together – or 10 people could have got together and bought the property, because it’s 37,000 sq ft, and that, divided by 10 means 10 people could have had a house of over 3500 sq ft and it would have made financial sense,” he says.

“People do need to think outside the box in looking to buy property, because there is an opportunity to buy larger properties and subdivide them: it happens an awful lot in the UK and in Europe, where the system of ownership and tenancy is much further developed than it is in Ireland.

“In the UK, they have things called ‘99-year leases’, so you have full ownership and occupational rights for 99 years, and we need to look at how we own buildings because there are huge opportunities,” he says, citing the instances of the two convents currently on sale at Roscrea and Sligo.

“In Sligo, there’s an amazing convent on sale, and it’s not in bad condition, and it would make eight amazing homes within the property itself. And that’s on sale at the moment for half a million euro.

“There are huge opportunities around the country to group together and to buy amazing buildings. You could have a 2,500 sq ft or a 3000 ft sq ft house, finished, for €300,000.”

Taking it further, he says not every household in a complex would necessarily have to have a car: there could be a shared ‘Go Car’, and people could book slots as needed.

“The obstacles currently in the way are bank mortgages and insurance, and it’s a matter of resolving that,” he says.

“That’s one of the areas I want to explore, because one of the impediments to doing up buildings that are neglected and uninhabitable, but that have a roof on them, is insurance.

“And because you can’t get insurance on the building, you cannot get a mortgage.”

A potential means through which this sort of scheme could get off the ground would be under the auspices of one of the housing bodies already in existence: they already have a familiarity with the sort of rules and regulations that would be required, he says.

An alternative, Mr Wallace continues, would be that a group of buyers could form a co-operative, and cost the entire project, taking into account purchase costs,