The Bridge House in Kilkenny city will be reopened by next summer as part of the Rivercourt Hotel.
The building just off John’s Bridge on John’s Street was badly damaged by fire two years ago.
But planning permission’s been granted for the plan to restore the historic home.
The hotel’s owned by the Neville Hotel Group and Therese Kelly says they’ve big plans for the project, telling KCLR “We’re planning on new bedrooms, new suites and then in the main drawing room which is still, even though destroyed by the fire, it’s still quite beautiful, parts of it, so the existing ornately decorated ceiling that’ll be restored and we’re planning a function and conference space there which will lead out into a conservatory then to the rear of the house and all of that will have magnificent views of the river and the castle as well and obviously we’ll be reinstating the main entrance door and the external of the building which are both located on John Street”.
She adds “It’s a building rated with national importance as well so we’ll be taking that on board but it’s something we have a wealth of experience in in that one of the hotels in the group as well, The Royal Marine Hotel, was a listed building and we did major renovations to that between 2005 and 2007 and we operate that now still at the minute so we’re very aware and very conscious of what is required to bring buildings such as these back to their former glory”.
