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ANDREA HORAN IS the owner of Ireland’s most kitsch and colourful nail salon – Tropical Popical. Passionate about community and communication, the self-described ‘extroverted introvert’ lives in The Tenters area of Dublin city. Andrea speaks to Ruth O’Connor about the joys of her forever home.
Andrea Horan was renting in Dublin’s Portobello when she began her house hunting journey: “I thought I wanted to buy there but I had found that the vibe had changed. I love to chat to people and am passionate about community and neighbourhood and when I first moved into the Portobello area it used to all about that but over time I felt that the neighbourhood was changing and that people weren’t very friendly anymore.”
“My friend Veda was living in The Tenters and used to walk her dog every night. She’d report back about the For Sale signs on houses that hadn’t made it onto the internet yet. I put an offer in for one house but didn’t get it and then my house came up,” says Andrea.
These are the original old workers’ houses so it’s mad that they are now so valuable. As a corner house, I thought this house had a lot of potential, so I put an offer in and it was accepted by a lovely family who even left me a bottle of wine when I moved in.”
Location and a sense of perspective are extremely important to Andrea when it comes to her home. “My outlook on life is one of trying to escape the economy, trying to be happy with what we have and not being constantly driven by success and accumulation. I realise that I am extremely lucky to have this house. I am not driven to move to a huge redbrick – there are only two of us and two dogs,” she says. “I would love less people to be caught up in this constant drive to have more. This house is perfectly formed for us, it does everything we need it to do – it provides an escape for the introvert in me but can also come alive for a party – it’s a house that can adapt to do lots of things.”
This homeowner is passionate about embracing the community she lives in. “My area is a working class area that is driven by community and it’s a lovely place to live – there is a strong identity and great people working in the community,” she says. “Obviously gentrification is happening and I am part of that, we are the problem to some extent, so I think it is very important to accept an area as it is, to find joy in it as it is and not to try to make it different.”
Having employed an architect to work on the designs for her home and having received planning permission, the builders were just breaking ground when the Covid-19 pandemic struck.
“My salon was shut down so my potential earnings were gone but also what, in my mind, should have been a 12-week build ended up taking a year. The financial pressure was huge because the business had to completely shut down. It was terrifying,” says Andrea. “I was living in Portobello at the time but couldn’t afford to pay rent as well as to get the house finished so I moved back in with my Mam.”
She describes moving into her new home as “the most joyous thing”: “People find it surprising when I say that I’m shy but I think I am an extroverted introvert,” she says. “Being extroverted when I’m out and about takes up all my energy so I really value being at home. Living with my Mam was a gorgeous experience but I couldn’t wait to be on my couch in my own house doing everything on my own schedule.”
“I’m now with my partner John but originally the house was very much designed for me and my needs – for example it was a three bed when I moved in but I changed that to make way for a lovely staircase, a designated wardrobe area and a bigger bathroom,” she says.
When I was speaking to my builder it was never about what would sell well. This is my forever home and it was about my needs, not the needs of some prospective future buyer. I’m not trying to accumulate value – I am trying to create the life I want to live.”
The starting point when discussing the renovation with her architect centred around the spaces which bring her most joy. “The answer was in a club, in a yoga studio and on holidays,” says Andrea. “And the house really does, I think, reflect those three things. At nighttime there are neon lights everywhere and I have the huge disco ball that once hung in The South William bar. The curves throughout the house bring to mind the architecture of César Manrique on Lanzarote but it also feels a little bit Greek because of the blue and white everywhere. And, while there is a lot of stuff on the walls, the fact that it’s basically a white box makes me think of a yoga studio.”
While it may be a white box there is no dearth of colour and the house, to paraphrase its owner, is certainly “statement-led”. The couch, made by Sofa so Good in Navan is covered in leopard print fabric by House of Hackney. The wallpaper features a Monstera botanical print and you’ll find a unicorn on the wall. Elsewhere you’ll find an internal porch painted in Eve Klein blue – a colour which is repeated on the coffee table, wall planters and staircase rails.
Contemporary works of art feature strongly in Andrea’s home. There’s the Andrea as Ursula painting by Anna Moloney and works by Maser, Leah Hewson and Peter Doyle. You’ll find activist pieces by Veda, pieces that featured in RENAILSSANCE – Tropical Popical’s 2019 response to the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Ireland and even a framed dress by Irish fashion designer Simone Rocha.
Colour is everywhere in this home. There’s the fluorescent pink dining booth and the bright yellow downstairs loo, the blue and white striped tiles in the kitchen and the very kitsch pink upstairs bathroom complete with mirror backlit in red neon. More kitsch can be found in the form of Andrea’s Lady on the Rock sculpture, her 1980s Golden Girls-esque lamp, her Testa di Moro plant pots that are very White Lotus and her thrifted hostess trolley.
I love kitsch and tack but in a considered way. On Meath Street there’s a shop that sells gorgeous tacky pieces that I love – there is tat and tack in my house but it’s all in the right place,” says the homeowner. “The first gift that my partner John gave me was my ‘Delicious’ neon sign. I love food and the pursuit of a delicious life so I really love that piece.”
In contrast to all this visual interest, the main bedroom is completely white – providing a reprieve from the colour and vibrancy found in the rest of the house. “It’s like walking into a white cloud,” says the homeowner of her favourite room in the house.“It’s one of our favourite spaces in the house and an oasis of calm.”
Another favourite aspect of the house is the connectivity that the open plan living area has with the outdoor living space which features planting by Mark Grehan of The Garden. Featuring tropical plants including banana trees and bamboo, the space acts as an extension of the living room – perfect for convivial summer gatherings. At the front of the house, the old school sunburst design on the gate and bamboo leaf embossed glass have nods to the home’s original design elements.
Some of the splurges in Andrea’s home include the artworks by Leah Hewson and Peter Doyle as well as her white cooker by Smeg. “It’s not that easy to come across white countertop cookers so I spent a good bit of money on a Smeg in order to get a white one. I can never understand perfectly designed kitchens with a big black cooker in the middle of it. I am very detail-oriented when it comes to things like that,” she says of her white kitchen units. A passionate advocate for building resilient urban communities and the development of the night time economy, Andrea’s colourful taste extends to her second home – the Tropical Popical salon in Dublin’s South William Street.
“My salon is my second home and is created to be a space that’s fun and that sets people at ease,” says Andrea. “It is a social and interactive space that encourages people to talk and connect. We encourage cross conversation. People are staying home so much and relying on their digital lives, loneliness is up and connection is down so anything that drives connection for me is very important.”
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