Where garden and house collide

An archway draped with climbing roses over the gravel driveway creates a sense of occasion - you are entering somewhere special.

When Primrose Cottage appears it doesn’t disappoint. I actually said, ‘Wow’ - it’s probably the reaction shared by most first time visitors to the home of Monica McCormick and Eugene Farrelly in Kill, near Kilnaleck.

Monica has endured health battles over the last year, reducing the amount of energy she can devote to her garden. And yet, it remains an enchanted space.

There’s an atmosphere of joyous abandon, and trust in nature that reflects the couple’s vibe. Chatting over coffee for an hour or two the conversation freewheels into unexpected places. They’re wonderful company.

Averse to regimented gardens - Monica quips she feels like saluting when entering gardens with rows of flowers - she describes her aim for the garden when they bought the house three decades ago as: “A bit wild, a bit untamed looking, but colourful, and to mix vegetables and wild flowers together in the same garden - which I do.”

A bee-keeper, she wanted it to nourish her pollintators.

“Eugene had asthma and someone told me that honey is good for asthma, so we got a beehive. It cured it actually - cured his sinus, cured his asthma.”

Her other insistance was that there should be no lawn.

“It’s just a completely useless piece of grass. Have you ever known anybody who does anything on their lawn?”

As such Monica’s garden is teaming with mature trees, and perennial flowers often “blues and purples” which she has observed thrive.

“I love that colour,” she says pointing to a hydrangea slip from her a maginficent shrub from her garden - “It’s like an electric blue.

“And I love poppies, red poppies,” she says. “I love plants that self seed - you never know - they could come up here this year, and over there the next year. It’s a nice surprise.”

As for weeding, she offers that she does “practically none”.

She recalls having a gardening club visit her home once and noticed how “they were disgusted” by what they saw.

“I could see them nudging each other and pointing,” she recalls, mouthing the word weeds.

“I just leave it to its own devices - it’s not completely wild, it is controlled.”

That control is exerted subtly through the positioning of paths, stone walls and the gravel driveway. A short stroll from the front door four raised beds reside for a collage of veg and flowers, and out of site they have a polytunnel too. With big timber floorboards it’s a wonderful space to relax.

“I grow most of my salad stuff in the tunnel, because it [the garden] is so shaded and there’s a lot of trees so there’s a lot of roots,” says Monica.

Apart from the cascading nasturtiums, the highlight is a dessert grape vine. Its roots reach deep into the soil outside while the vine luxuriates in the polytunnel’s warmth and repays amply in bunches.

The cottage too is truly grogeous; a continuation of their garden. A casual arrangement of colourful potted plants merge into a combination of climbers and vines that clamber up the cottage walls and wash across the entire roof.

The display includes ivy, Russian vine, pyracantha, climbing rose and fuchsia.

“It’s just starting to go red now,” Monica admires of one of the climbers which looks like partheocissus. It promises to be a real spectacle in a few weeks when it fully reddens against the verdant ivy.

“The Irish for fuchsia is deora Dé, tears of God,” says Eugene, hinting at their other passion. The couple, along with Eugene Kiernan, are instrumental in encouraging the use of Irish in Kilnaleck, and ultimately the opening of ‘Suil Eile’ cafe.

“If it gets too big, I’ll cut it back in the winter,” Monica assures of some of the more rapidly growing plants.

She agrees that many people would be afraid to let ivy near their roof. Eugene suggests that Monica initially shared this concern and when he was away for a week some years ago, she had it removed.

“People had been saying it would get under the slates. When it had been taken off the slates were as clean as they ever were,” Eugene marvels.

“I don’t really care about undermining it to be quite honest,” Monica asserts. “Obviously I wouldn’t like leaks. But I’m really not that concerned and I like the look of it.”

The remarkable house hasn’t gone unnoticed by locals. Eugene recalls: “A man in town said, ‘Where do you live?’ And I explained where I lived and he said: ‘Oh you’re the fella lives in the hedge!’”

Living ensconced in nature recently saw them have a surprise visitor to the livingroom.

“The door was open and I was sitting with the cat there, and next thing this thing came over my head like an eagle and I was like ‘What the f*ck!’

“It was sparrowhawk and it had a wingspan,” Eugene says parting his hands a foot and a half apart.

“A beauty,” Monica chimes in as she takes out her phone to show a short clip of Eugene releasing the young sparrowhawk unharmed outside.

Monica’s right, a beauty. Just like their garden.