Millmount, Kilkenny, co Kilkenny 

Mark Bence-Jones. A Guide to Irish Country Houses (originally published as Burke’s Guide to Country Houses volume 1 Ireland by Burke’s Peerage Ltd. 1978); Revised edition 1988 Constable and Company Ltd, London. 

p. 206. “A house of two storeys over a basement built probably between 1760-70 by William Colles, owner of the nearby Kilkenny Marble Works, which supplied the familiar black marble chimneypieces to houses all over Ireland. Of an unusual cruciform plan, one arm having a pedimented one bay end with a Venetian doorway; the two arms at right angles ending in curved bows.” 

https://www.buildingsofireland.ie/buildings-search/building/12402007/mill-mount-house-highrath-madockstown-kilkenny

Detached three-bay two-storey over basement Classical-style house with dormer attic, c.1775, on a cruciform plan with single-bay two-storey pedimented projecting entrance bay to centre, single-bay two-storey side elevations having single-bay full-height bows, and single-bay two-storey return to south. Mostly refenestrated. Hipped slate roof on a cruciform plan (gabled to entrance bay and to return; continuing into half-conical roofs to bows) with clay ridge tiles, rendered chimney stacks, slightly sproketed eaves, and cast-iron rainwater goods on moulded cut-limestone eaves having iron brackets. Unpainted rendered walls with cut-limestone dressings including carved stringcourse to basement, quoins to corners, and moulded surround to pediment. Square-headed window openings (lunette window opening to pediment) with cut-limestone sills, cut-limestone surrounds (no surrounds to basement), and replacement uPVC casement windows retaining eight-over-eight timber sash windows to basement having wrought iron bars. Venetian door opening with cut-limestone surround including channelled piers supporting moulded cornice, moulded archivolt having keystone, timber panelled door having sidelights, and fanlight. Interior with timber panelled shutters to window openings. Road fronted. 

Appraisal 

A well-appointed Classical-style house built for William Colles (n. d.) with the scale and fine detailing suggesting a patron of substantial means having associations with the nearby Highrath Marble Sawing Mill complex (not included in survey). Distinctive attributes enhancing the formal architectural design value of the composition include a Venetian door arrangement, elegant bows, and so on while limestone dressings displaying good quality craftsmanship further enliven the external expression of the house. However, while most of the attributes survive in place including evidence of the original fabric to the interior the character of the house has not benefited from the insertion of inappropriate replacement fittings to most of the openings. 

Paddy Rossmore. Photographs. Edited by Robert O’Byrne. The Lilliput Press, Dublin 7, 2019. 

“Mill Mount was the site of a marble works established in the early eighteenth century by local entrepreneur William Colles who invented machinery for sawing, boring and polishing stone, all of which formerly had to be done by hand… He is believed to have been the builder of several country houses such as Bessborough and Woodstock, as well as the Tholsel in Kilkenny which he may also have designed. Following his death in 1770, the business was inherited by a son, also called William Colles, and he is said to have designed and built Mill Mount, presumably before his own death in 1779. …”