Family set to cater to hob-nobs in West Cork's star-struck Ballydehob village

Thu, 04 Jul, 2024 - 07:14

Property Editor Tommy Barker reports

TALK about the Ballydehob-nobs...

Acting royalty from the UK to LA will be ten a penny at the counter of a star-studded West Cork hot-spot cafe/ deli/bakery that has changed hands, just in time for a set-piece role in a new Neil Jordan movie to star Helena Bonham Carter, local thespian and resident Jeremy Irons, and Aidan Quinn, amongst others.

Hungry for success: Paul Mescal in Schull, near Ballydehob: he's one of a number of top Irish actors to buy in West Cork

New hands taking over at the long-established health/gourmet cafe and food shop Hudson’s, in the hilly village of Ballydehob are local couple Denis and Naomi O’Brien, parents to four young children/helpers, and entrepreneurial to their fingertips.

Like kids in a sweet-shop. Naomi and Denis O'Brien Conor, 10, Matilda, 5, Isla 8, and Sadie aged 3. Picture: Eddie O'Hare

Quantity surveyor Denis’s parents Barry and Caureen O’Brien own and run the Irish Whip bar in seasonally heaving Ballydehob; Naomi has had her own dog grooming business Hair of the Dog, and both are set to pivot to take over the 1980s-established Hudson’s, which had been offered last year with a €530,000 guide price/to lease.

They’ve bought the thriving food business, taking it over officially next week, and then are leasing the large street-side building, facing renowned Levis’s bar and the Michelin-starred restaurant Chestnut, from owners Catherine Melville and Geoff Caird: they had taken it on in 2015, also with four children in tow after they sold a Dublin chocolate business, Chocca Mocca, to a major UK operator.

At one stage more known for hippies than Hollywood, the tiny West Cork village of Ballydehob on the Wild Atlantic Way has more music and art festivals than you can shake a drum-stick at, and recent blow-in celebrity ‘locals’ include award-winning actors Paul Mescal in Schull, Saoirse Ronan in Ballydehob, and Robert Sheehan in a hideaway West Cork farmhouse off the N71.

This new movie/Hollywood elite join the likes of long-time residents Jeremy Irons in Skibbereen/Kilcoe, producer David Puttnam on the Ilen River, and writer and director Neil Jordan, who’s had a waterfront home on the Beara peninsula since the 1990s.

Neil Jordan at the premiere of "Ondine" during the 2010 Tribeca Film Festival in New York

Oscar-winner Jordan filmed Ondine in West Cork: now, he’s set to shoot an adaptation of his novel The Well of Saint Nobody locally, said to have Bonham Carter and Quinn lined up, along with Irons, in starring roles.

As part of pre-filming, locations and sets are being lined up for the Jordan flick. “We were asked if they could shoot in the shop and of course we said ‘yes!’ The kids want to be in in too,” says Naomi, originally from Bishopstown and now fully naturalised in West Cork.

Canine-do attitude: Naomi O'Brien is going from dog grooming in Hair of the Dog to gourmet service Pic: Eddie O'Hare

She’s passing on her Hair of the Dog pet grooming business to Caitriona O’Connell, a veterinary nurse, and rolling up her own sleeves for running the couple’s new challenge, trading as Beal Blasta, and taking on many of the existing staff (it rises 10 to 12 in peak season), including chefs Ann and Tracey.

The couple’s four children — Conor, 10, Isla, 8, Matilda, 5, and Sadie, 3 — are lining up with suggestions (“they want us to start stocking juice boxes again, they are used to work, stocking bottles at the Irish Whip at weekends”).

Naomi says she and Denis are “massive food fans”, adept with pizza ovens and doughs, meat smokers, and other gourmet accoutrements.