Established in 1988, Michael M Lyons Building Contractors Araglen Ltd is a proud family-run business dedicated to delivering quality craftsmanship and a personal service to every client. Over the past 37 years, the company has grown steadily while remaining firmly rooted in its founding values of integrity, commitment, and attention to detail.
Building Ireland recently spoke with Managing Director Michael Lyons Jnr, who shared insights into the company’s ongoing projects, future ambitions, and its recent nomination at the Irish Construction Industry (ICI) Awards.
Business is good these days at Michael M Lyons Building Contractors and the plan for Michael Lyons Jnr and the rest of the team in Araglen, Co Cork is to keep things that way for the foreseeable future.
The company operates with a core team of 10 skilled staff and collaborates with up to 50 trusted subcontractors, ensuring the right blend of expertise and resources for every project.
The company is very much a family run business.
Set-up by Michael Lyons Sr. 37 years ago, the firm’s founder is now 80 years old and remains involved in the business to this day as a director and maintains daily visits to most of the sites to keep a close eye on progress and quality. His son Michael Jnr recently took the reins as Managing Director and the latter’s wife Lucy Lyons looking after the Office management in Araglen.
Michael Jnr, who was born the same year the company was founded, has built a strong career in construction. Growing up around construction all his life and After qualifying as a Civil Engineer and Construction Manager he gained valuable experience with leading Irish firms such as John Sisk & Son and Vision Contracting before returning to the family business—something he describes as a natural progression and a privilege.
It was almost inevitable that the Corkonian would return to back home to work alongside his Dad once again.
Now, Michael Jnr heads up the family business and filled in Building Ireland in on the details of what is very much a thriving Building Contracting company nowadays.
“2024 was a great year for the company,” Michael outlined. “We successfully tendered for two public housing projects for Cork County Council following on from another similar development for the same client in 2023.
“We are growing steadily. We’ve experienced strong growth in recent years particularly post Covid and have reached a level of business we’re very comfortable with. At the moment, we’re busy with a new 48-house estate as well as a wide range of one-off projects that will keep us going well into next year.
“2026 is looking to be an excellent year based on work we have ongoing and due to start and also with the enquiries coming in the door. We seem to be predominantly residential at the moment but that is more to do with where the market is in our area rather than a conscious decision.
“We have extensive experience in Commercial and Educational also, as well as Conservation and Restoration and we are delighted to do these projects also when they come along.
“So business is very good at the moment and hopefully it’ll stay that way but we know all too well how cyclical the industry can be so we are always looking to have contingencies in place to try to keep the company going for another 37 years.”
The roots of the business are in building one-off family homes, and they remain committed to this as a core part of their work, complementing the larger projects they undertake.
“We currently have several one-off houses on site around East Cork and West Waterford. The houses can range from small projects to much larger projects and we are grateful to our community for clients recommending us to their friends and families for their projects. This always reassures us that the quality in what we provide is well received.
“We understand that each of these projects, while it may come naturally to us, can be a very stressful experience for our clients who may only take on a project like this once in their lives. We always aim to take the stress out of the process for our clients and if everybody is happy at the end of the day then that was a successful project for us. Life is too short for conflict and stress in projects, so we always endeavour to plan ahead with our clients and make every project as easy as possible for everyone.
“While we had a good hit rate in 2023 and 2024 with Public Tenders, as we all know they can be a bit of a lottery so we tend not to rely on them. The one-off housing, renovations etc will keep all our lads working when the public tenders may not materialise and that is important to us also.”
Community Projects
Being a local company they often get approached to tender for excellent projects which provide much needed facilities to the community.
“One of our favourite projects at the moment is a Boat House for Blackwater Sub Aqua Club in Fermoy,” said Michael. “The building itself is as simple as they come but the club that it is for provides a valuable service performing search and rescue missions along the blackwater. It gives us great pride to assist this club in their work by building a new boat house on the Blackwater to make their job that bit easier.
“Over the road in the Village of Kilworth, we’ve just commenced Phase Two of the project that we got nominated for, which is the Village Arts Centre which was a former Church of England Church that has been repurposed to hold music and theatre shows in the Village. This phase of the work involves the scaffolding, repointing, grouting and cleaning of the main steeple to the front of the church which is its Predominant Feature. This will complete the exterior works on that project fully.”
The Village Arts Centre in Kilworth, Co Cork is a project which the company first started work on during the summer of 2023.
Fast-forward to today and Michael M Lyons Building Contractors’ work on it sees the Cork-based business up for ‘Contractor Conservation Project of the Year’ at the prestigious Irish Construction Industry Awards, which take place on October 10th at the Convention Centre Dublin.
Delighted with the nomination, Michael Jnr was good enough to outline the details of the company’s work on the now award-nominated project to date.
“The goal of the first phase of the project was to prevent water ingress into the building which if left untouched would have potentially put the building beyond repair within a few years. We worked closely with well-known Conservation Architect Chris Southgate to get the building up to a standard that will see it stand strong for another 200 years.
“This Phase of the project was predominantly exterior work to the main spine of the building. The first element of the project to be tackled was the roof finishes and structure. The architect was keen to save as much of the original roof structure as possible which we are able to do thankfully due to the skill and knowledge of our in house carpenters.
“We had to replace about 75% of the slate on the roof due to the condition of the existing slate and a beautiful Glyndyne natural slate was sourced with the help of Philip Long from Lagan Building Solutions. This slate complimented the building brilliantly and the end result was fantastic thanks again to the workmanship of our carpenters and the quality materials.
“The second largest element of the building was the re-plastering of the church to its former glory and beyond. We employed a specialist Lime Plasterer Colman Howard, another local man, to hack back the original render and re plaster the building in traditional lime render. The finish on this was outstanding and was credit to Colman and his team.
“We restored all the cast iron guttering and down pipes, repaired some of the stained glass windows and fitted new custom made stainless steel window guards which were expertly crafted by Lissmark Engineering Ltd in Araglen to not overpower the windows but to compliment them.
“As stated previously the aim of the project was to prevent water ingress into the building and to be fair to community council and the architect, the decision to do an extensive upgrade was definitely the right thing to do in the long term.
“This was a lovely project to be involved in, our company office is literally only about five minutes out the road from it, it’s something we drive past every day and we are proud of the work completed on it so far.”
Now, looking towards the months ahead and into 2026 for his family’s business, Michael Jnr says the plan is to keep on the same trajectory and gradually grow at a slow and steady pace along the way.
“We’re just hoping to keep building, keep local people employed and keep the company strong for another 37-years at least and hopefully pass it to the next generation again.
“We’re building steadily and with a healthy turnover now. We’d be hoping to increase that slightly, but not growth for the sake of growth either because we want to keep the personal touch with the clients.
“Our aim is to continue developing our portfolio across all sectors. If we can deliver a few residential projects each year, complemented by a steady flow of one-off homes and a few community based projects, we’ll consider that a real success. The goal is simple — to keep the company healthy, maintain sustainable growth, and ensure it remains strong for the future,” he concluded.
Michael M Lyons Building Contractors Araglen Ltd.
Propogue,
Araglen,
Kilworth,
Co Cork.
Mobile: 087 796 0858
Email: [email protected]
This article was published in Building Ireland Magazine, Winter 2025, Vol 11 No 14
