Selling Delgany By The Brick

Here today, coffee shop tomorrow?

t will, of course, fetch a very pretty million or two…

And the fact that the latest chunk of Delgany history to go on the market is in the centre of the village and commercially zoned, well…

Ka-FECKIN’-CHING!

From the moment the mighty Noel Belton passed on October 15th 2019, the historic little nest of cottages he called home was pretty much bound to be sold. It wasn’t long after that his partner, Hazel Evans, was asking GG about any photographic evidence of their parking drive from years gone by. And today, we see an application for its retention, just beside the For Sale sign.

Noel Belton & Hazel

Locals will be unsurprised to find that the For Sale sign has the name Dooley on it, the angel Gabriel being a man who seems pretty determined to slice up Delgany into as many little lucrative little plots as he can. Despite the fact that he lives just 2 minutes up Bellevue Hill from his latest catch, in the Keelty’s old place, and reportedly has plans for his son – who’s looking after Delgany Close – to build in the garden.

Either way, it will be sad to see these four beautiful cottages – home to Noel and the likes of Siobhan Woodgates and Ollie Hayden in the ’70s and ’80s – being thrown to the wolves. Even if those wolves turn out to be super-classy, like the Firehouse, Pigeon and Grocer triumvirate next door. These historical buildings will no doubt be coffee shops, or wellness clinics, or plastic surgery havens, long before 2022 is done.

That the largest of the four cottages (running up that hill) was originally built by the La Touche family up at Bellevue House as a factory making straw hats for the French market perhaps does give this latest twist a sense of coming full circle.

Not yet listed on the Dooley website, we’re hoping to get a little bit more of that history nailed down in the coming weeks. Sadly, Gabriel hasn’t yet answered our afternoon email for more details.

In the meantime, you can jump back to December 2016, and our interview with the Delgany deity himself, Noel Belton, as he waxes lyrical about growing up in paradise.