Much of the revamp is already complete, and is looking good, ready for the September onslaught of the Ryder Cup golfers, many of whom who will make the hotel their base, and Russian investors such as Chelsea Football Club's Roman Abramovich and his entourage, who have been invited to the castle's Great Hall exhibition of contemporary Russian art.

When Red Sky Design moved into Clontarf Castle they saw red . . . and it had nothing to do with their company's logo or, indeed, with Russian art. Josephine Beatty just knew that the castle, with religious and royal traditions, was ripe for red. Not just any one red but a myriad variations on the theme: plum, purple and maroon for the wallpaper to ruby for chandeliers, crimson for pillars, wine for the glass art objects, pink swirls on damask curtains and orange in the cushions.

Reflecting the importance of colour to the whole project, the main bar, where the interior revamp is now complete, is called The Indigo Bar. But the use of colour doesn't stop there. There are forays into complementary colours such as lilac, violet and gold for upholstery, with touches of lime in the carpet.

Beattie is right up there with the Victorians, who borrowed and mixed and matched from every decade. Thus, she has mixed art nouveau (trailing floral vine motif) with art deco (white minimalist porcelain), touches of Oriental (in the wallpaper) and Greek orthodox (incense burners).

What she is is hoping to achieve is a harmonious whole. "The designs, the palette of materials and colours are applied throughout the hotel in the bedrooms, corridors and conference rooms and the great hall, " Beattie says.

She believes that, in the tradition of good hotel design, every interior should really be revamped every seven or eight years. "Hotels are highmaintenance. Look around you, and even this entire renovation will be in a skip in seven years." Her mission is to maintain an antique decor with a modern twist.

With that in mind, the sofas, chairs and tables are exact replicas of antique designs in solid wood. "We were concerned about the strength of the structure. We found much of what we were looking for at Dutch Connection in Bolton, in Greater Manchester. They had a massive catalogue of different designs.

We commissioned 10 different types of chair and several Victorian federal scrolled backed sofas".

The wallpaper came from Osborne & Little in London, who have a great stock of vintage designs. They were able to take old patterns and recolour them. The leather wallpaper came from the US via Textura in Glasgow.

Beattie and her team approached the design in a democratic way by providing the manager and owners with mood boards illustrating ideas they thought they might want, and introducing concepts that they thought the hotel wouldn't even think of applying, such as the ruby red chandeliers.

Surprisingly, the latter went down well and are now hanging in the Indigo bar.

Seeing red was one thing, but seeing the light was equally important. The bar previously had a dark interior with little daylight, so they raised the ceiling to double the height, using floating slabs at different levels, and illuminated them with concealed halo glow lighting so that even areas away from a window seemed to be in daylight. A sense of height was introduced by bringing the pillars back to their original curved shapes and using a vertical wallpaper to make them look taller. "We were after a sense of airiness and light".

For this reason the floor is a light-coloured travertino stone cut into large slabs. Perspective is important, too. The long single line of red tile that stretches from the entrance door to the far end of the room to the fireplace is a kind of level that holds everything together. Clients are inclined to walk along it. By contrast, the bar veers at angles to it, so that there is a sense of space.

"We were playing with perspective, " says Beattie. "This type of design gives the impression of being in different rooms while being in the same space. We played with scale all the time. Just as you walk into the bar we placed a huge Victorian mirror to bounce the light around so the area wouldn't seem narrow."

The idea of working with height is again used in the foyer. While it is four stories high with a glass atrium, something was still needed to draw the eye upwards. The existing four steel columns provided the answer. Entwining an art nouveau vine design around them and spiralling it all the way up attracts the eye to the ancient tapestries, the fine old castle walls, the old turrets, the stone niches and windows.

"We were always aware of the old structures, " Beattie says. "We have conservation architects working with us, so we know what's listed. For instance, the tiles in the hall and the panelling in the Great Hall are listed. We retained the old stone wall and window in The Indigo Bar."

While colour and light may have been major considerations in this makeover, Beattie says art was most important.

"Once the colour and lighting are right, a concentration on art is what is at the heart of the matter. The entire design concept is an artistic endeavour.

Every shelf or niche has been turned into a veritable art space that holds a piece of glass sculpture. There are abstract paintings strategically placed at regular intervals along the walls."

It was not surprising then that Clontarf Castle chose to celebrate its transformation by teaming up with Magil Fine Art to stage a major exhibition, of contemporary Russian art entitled 'The Emerging Russia . . . A New Era', in the hotel's Great Hall on 14 September. The artists hail from all over Russia and the former Soviet Union, including Moscow, St Petersburg, Siberia, Georgia, Estonia and Armenia, and the work has the same richness and diversity Beattie sought for the castle.

The future may be orange, red and vibrant, but Dermot Hennessy insists that the hotel never forgets the castle's illustrious past, which is the thing that attracts the golfers, the oligarchs and everyone else.

Clontarf Castle Hotel, Castle Avenue, Clontarf.

Telephone: 01 - 833 2321

SOURCES Stone Floors: Tiles Unlimited, Belfast Wallpaper: Textura, Glasgow Vintage wallpaper: Osborne & Little, London Furniture (chairs, couches): Dutch Connections, Bolton, UK Granite counter top: Maghera Granite, Belfast Opal Bar Counter glass: Topglass, Maghera, Co Derry (00-44-2879 644748) Floating ceiling panels: Hillcrest Joinery, Belfast Fabric: Designers Guild, London.

Curtain make-up: Bracken Blinds, Carryduff, Co Down Tub chairs: Balmoral Furniture, Belfast (00-44-2890 301411)

THE TEAM

Red Sky Design is a team of qualified architects (Yvonne Huey, Josephine Beattie and Alwyn Whiteman) with a backup team of technical staff, which specialises in hotel architecture and interior design.

The company carries out interior design projects on hotels, bars and restaurants.

Telephone: (00-44) 2890584537 Mobile: (00-353) 871276298

CASTLE HISTORY The original castle was built by Hugh de Lacy in 1172 as part an inner circle of defensive sites protecting Dublin. In 1649, Oliver Cromwell granted the estate to John Blackwell, who sold it to John Vernon, Cromwell's Quartermaster-General in Ireland. The Vernons were in Clontarf for almost 300 years. In 1835, the building was deemed unsafe due to weak foundations, so it was demolished and rebuilt.

Clontarf Castle as we know it now was completed in 1837, a towering castellated pile with huge stone walls, great bay windows and multiple turrets. After the male line of the Vernons failed, the castle passed through various owners before becoming one of Ireland's most renowned cabaret venues under current owners, Gerry and Carmel Houlihan, until April 1997. In 1998, in a partnership venture, the Houlihans turned the castle into a four-star hotel.