Light-filled home amongst the trees in Offaly inspired one non-gardener’s green fingers

Asking price: €700,000

Agent: DNG Kelly Duncan (057) 932 5050

​Martina Motz really doesn't mind the feeling of being "up in the air" that comes with moving house. In fact, that is exactly what she wants.

A chandler by profession, Motz is the proprietor of Duffy & Scott, the midlands-based candle manufacturer. But flying is the passion that burns brightest in her.

Motz took to the skies later in life but has become hooked on aviation — she is determined to make sure as many hours as possible are skyborne ones.

Bringing new meaning to the overused term "convenient for the airport", the businesswoman is set to move to the other side of Tullamore, where she owns an airstrip and has acquired an adjoining property, with the idea of making a home for herself and husband Scott Erickson.

Erickson is also a pilot, albeit a professional one, and currently divides his time between Co Offaly and the United States.

Motz bought the airstrip from the family of the late local businessman and keen amateur pilot Jimmy Spollen, and persuaded the owners of the adjacent, unconnected house to sell up. ​

"The way the weather is in Ireland, it always seems to be better in the mornings and the afternoons," she says. "I want to be able to wake up beside the airstrip, so I can just open the hangar doors and take off straight away. The house happened to be beside the strip, so we literally just had to cut a hole in the hedge."

Motz never flies overseas but likes to take the odd jaunt up to Donegal or the Aran Islands. Mostly, she says, she likes to just go up and fly around a bit, enjoying the thrill of taking off and landing.

A qualified engineer, she carries out most of her own aircraft maintenance. "I have always been good with machines," she says. "I grew up on a farm and my dad encouraged us to learn how to fix stuff from a very young age, As soon as our legs were long enough, he taught us how to drive a tractor."

Motz started off in the candle business with her late husband Willy in the early 1980s, when the couple lived in Dublin in a one-bedroom city centre apartment.

They opened a candle factory in Annesley Place, but then decided to move the operation to the country after the business was vandalised a number of times.

"We didn't want to move out of Dublin," Motz says. "So at first, we used to sleep in the factory during the week and come back to Dublin at the weekends, where we lived in the Irish Life building on Talbot Street.

"We loved it. We had a balcony overlooking a garden in the middle of the city and we loved the fact that you could have pizza delivered to your door in minutes, which was a big deal in those days."

I went from somebody who didn't want a garden to living with so much plant life. It's magic. I really think this house has a soul

Eventually, the couple tired of the commutes, and began looking for a permanent base in Tullamore.

"We didn't want a big garden. I wasn't really into gardening and Willy had zero interest," Motz says. "Then we saw this house with almost four acres of woodland, and there was something about it. We just couldn't get it out of our heads.

"It was in terrible shape. The lawn was more of a hollow and there were these big, dirty pine trees. It was so dense with trees, and there were briars and brambles. But we just loved it. It had a special feel, so we scraped the money together between family and friends and bought it.

"It was unusual. It's an Australian design, so it has big windows, practically from ceiling to floor, so even though you're in the middle of trees, it has lots of light.

"We moved in and put a few pots and pans under the leaks where the rain came through. We rewired it, replumbed it, put new double-glazed windows and a new roof on. I knocked out a few walls and made it basically what it is now.

"On Sundays, while Willy watched Formula 1 on the telly, I would be outside, tackling the briars."

The couple had a little help with landscaping from Mother Nature. There was a line of pine trees going up the drive until in 1986, Hurricane Charley knocked most of them over like ninepins.

The couple realised how much more light there was without them, and set about replacing most other trees on the site with native deciduous species.

The 'California bungalow' style house at Ross Road was built to an Australian design, with just under 1,500sq ft of living accommodation and four acres of gardens. It is double brick built with insulation in between, and there is practically nowhere inside you can't see outside.

The property has three bedrooms and two bathrooms. There is a guest bathroom/ utility as well as a kitchen/ breakfast room and a conservatory dining room. The sitting room has vaulted ceilings and floor-to-ceiling windows, as well as a sandstone hearth with wood-burning stove.

The house is fitted out with furniture the couple brought from Germany, decorated in what might be described as mid-century California style. Outside, there is a large garage/ shed (circa 500sq ft) and a pond.

"I really never thought I would be moving out of this house," Motz says. "I really like living in woodland and went from somebody who didn't want to have a garden — who used to bring plants home to die — to living in practically four acres with so much plant life. It's magic. I really think this house has a soul."

But while it may have a soul, it doesn't — like her new home across town — have a runway or an aircraft hangar. The sun is still shining as the interview ends. Motz must fly.

Ross Road has an asking price of €700,000 with DNG Kelly Duncan.