It takes about half a day and some 5,000 miles to get from the concrete canyons of Los Angeles to the grassy hills of Ireland, but that sense of literal and figurative distance was a big part of the country’s appeal for two busy Hollywood insiders. “Ireland doesn’t have the white noise that America has—you don’t have this sense of constantly being advertised to,” says Adam McKay, the Academy Award–winning director, producer, and screenwriter who, along with his wife, the writer-director Shira Piven, made a sleepy town in the Irish countryside their second home. “In Los Angeles, there’s always this buzzing. We just immediately talked about how quiet and relaxing it was to be here.”
In large part that’s because the English-style house they found—with help from an Irish publicist friend and her family—is set on 12 heavily wooded acres along the banks of a protected lough in County Cavan, in a region where there are more sheep than people and the nearest neighbors are at least a half-mile in either direction. The land itself had only changed hands twice in its 400-year history, and the closest town is 11 miles away.
Vintage French Art Deco pendants hang above a locally crafted table and circa-1880 Gothic oak chairs, which were originally used in the House of Commons in London, in the dining room. The rug, by Marc Phillips , is one of many instances where designer Alison Koch incorporated wool as a nod to one of the country’s main trades.
But it also helped that the 5,000-square-foot, eight-bedroom home that already existed on the property had what McKay describes as “good energy” thanks to the care lavished on it by its previous owner, who built the house and lived there with his wife for more than 30 years. “It had this sense of light and space and quiet that was really lovely,” says Piven, who scouted the property with the couple’s two teenage daughters while McKay was working on a project in London. After virtual visits and elaborate Skype tours of the grounds, they went all in on turning the house into a writer’s retreat, a base for exploring the Continent, and a part-time getaway for family and friends.
To nail the low-key work/play aesthetic they were looking for, the couple enlisted designer Alison Koch, who also worked on their main residence in Los Angeles but took a slightly more eclectic approach here. Luckily for the couple, the house required very few major renovations, so they opted instead for cosmetic changes to enhance the home’s warm, inviting air while modernizing its English brick-and-stucco aesthetic. “They wanted something bright because you’re always dealing with cloudy days and rain in Ireland,” says Koch, “but there also had to be a little bit of drama.”
“The entire house is covered in ivy in the spring,” says Koch of the creeping vines that appear on the house’s brick exterior.
In addition to the existing fireplace, vintage midcentury armchairs clad in textured red wool, an 18th-century verde antico marble table by Piet Jonker , and a Lawrence of La Brea rug create contrast with the white plaster walls in the study.
After replacing the hardwood floors, gutting the kitchen and baths, and installing a new, more streamlined staircase, Koch introduced a limited palette of saturated hues—namely olive greens and grays, with unexpected bursts of color inspired by the surrounding landscape—to add contrast to the house’s white plaster walls and establish a sense of intimacy throughout the airy rooms. Rust-colored cabinetry mingles with gray limestone flooring and white oak countertops in the kitchen, while a claw-foot tub in a guest bath pits a soothing shade of curry against an ornate blue-tinged House of Hackney wallpaper.
Koch also relied on a coterie of Old World European antiques vendors to complement midcentury pieces purchased back in L.A., furnishing the space in a way that honors the history of the property as well the comfort of the McKay-Pivens’ modern lifestyle. A sleek 18th-century Piet Jonker cocktail table pairs seamlessly with a tufted midcentury-style Lee Stanton sofa in the study, while a rustic 1850s Swedish pine table repurposed as a nightstand lends patina and age to a 1950s brass-and-glass chandelier by Pamono in a guest bedroom. In a nod to one of Ireland’s most important traditional trades, wools appear throughout. “Alison did a really masterful job of making the house feel beautiful without being ostentatious,” says McKay.
Koch’s ability to create interiors that establish a strong sense of place while fading into the background of everyday life has allowed the family to ease into a slower pace, one that encourages cooking at home over takeout (it’s unavailable here anyway), reading over screen time, and gardening over gallivanting. “If it weren’t for the minks and martens, we’d probably have a bunch of chickens running around,” says McKay. But the house has also given them an inspirational backdrop for getting down to business, whether that’s hosting an impromptu jam session, as they did last New Year’s Eve, when neighbors arrived with instruments in hand, or working on the next project. “It’s an incredible place to write,” says McKay, who recently finished a script in just three weeks at the 12-foot library table that is now his desk. It’s bound to touch off another flurry of activity that will, no doubt, bring his family right back here to decompress.