You’ve probably passed its imposing entrance.

But no matter how much you crane your neck from the car window, it’s impossible to see the full splendour of Tivoli’s historic Lota Beg House.

In fact, only a handful of people have been inside since its owner Vincent Hart passed away in 1939.

Now that it’s for sale (the guide price is a cool €4.5m) we’ve finally been invited to take a peek at the beautiful old period building, set on 28.12 acres of private parkland and forest, all just 4km from the city centre.

Built between 1780 and 1820, Lota Beg House is one of a group of houses in Tivoli associated with the Lota demesnes, which were populated by monied Corkonians who preferred not to mix with the riffraff in the city centre.

A visit begins beneath the iconic stone arch, decorated with a magnificent Irish wolfhound (a tribute to a dog that saved the previous owner Daniel Callaghan MP from drowning) and guests travel along a tree-lined driveway.

Only then is the elegant house, designed by Abraham Hargrave, who also designed Michael Flatley’s Castle Hyde home in Fermoy, is revealed.

One of its most notable features is the glamorous bow on the entrance porch.

Inside there’s an immense circular domed entrance hallway, around which snakes a cantilevered timber staircase up to the first-floor gallery.

While you’ll need to fit your own modern bathrooms, the property boasts six bedrooms, ready to be transformed into your own little kingdom fit for a merchant prince or princess.

Other highlights include a vast dining room, entered via double doors and lit by huge windows looking out onto the grounds and gardens and a wallpapered drawing-room that likely hosted the city’s most important ladies for tea.

While the contents of the property (an incredible collection of art, silver, furniture from India and China, taxidermy, artefacts and other historic objects worth almost €1m) were auctioned in 2016, what remains is a time capsule from another era, mostly untouched.

You can still see the outline where some of the larger pieces stood for decades in the wallpaper.

Handsome original fireplaces sit in many of the rooms and will no doubt prove useful when winter rolls around again and the enormous rooms need to be warmed.

While the house, gate lodge and entrance are all listed as being structures of ‘Regional Importance’, they are not protected structures.

Got €4.5m to spend on a new home? Lota Beg is listed here with estate agent Andrew Nolan of Goffs Property in Co Kildare.

Once you get over the €450,000 deposit, your monthly repayments will only be €14k.