21 CLARENDON ST.

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Mid-Victorian mid-terrace two-bay three-storey with attic townhouse, built c.1874. Rectangular on plan with projecting rear return. Principal elevation faces north set behind a low level rendered boundary wall surmounted by replacement metal railings. No's 17, 19 and 21 Clarendon Street are distinctive in character and were the last properties to have been built in this terrace of twelve predominately brick faced townhouses.

Single red brick chimneystack to west side, centred on ridge with nine octagon-shaped clay pots.

Principal front (north) elevation is painted render to ground floor and red Flemish bond brick to upper floors with a rendered band to eaves. All windows are 1/1 timber sliding sash (square-headed to ground floor, segmental-arched to upper floors) unless otherwise noted.
Square-headed opening to entrance doorway to left surmounted by a projecting moulded cornice supported by a pair of pilasters painted in contrasting colour and console brackets with acanthus leaf detail to either side of a paired half leaf two-panelled painted timber doors with single-pane square-headed overlight.
Single tripartite (1/1,1/1,1/1) timber sliding sash window to right of door surmounted by a hood mould supported by four console brackets with acanthus leaf detail painted in contrasting colour. Two windows to first and second floors (those to upper floors are not aligned with ground floor openings). First floor windows have a continuous sill course and painted moulded surrounds with keystone detail. Second floor windows have painted moulded surrounds.
Pitched slated roof dormer to attic level with a painted casement window with top hung opening lights.

East and west elevations abutted by adjoining buildings No.19 & No. 23 Clarendon Street (HB01/21/005H & HB01/21/005J respectively).

South (rear) elevation is cement rendered three-storey with attic. Cement rendered pitched roof four-storey rear return to right. The fenestration pattern is irregular with a selection of casements and 1/1 & 2/2 timber sliding sash windows. Ground floor windows are obscured by metal grills. Rear elevation not fully visible at time of survey.
Two 1/1 timber sliding sash windows to ground floor; single 1/1 timber sliding sash window to first and second floor left; pitched roof dormer to left with casement window.

Rear return south gable fenestration pattern is irregular and comprises a single window opening to ground floor to left; abutted to right by a single-storey pitched roof building with blank south gable and east face. West face comprises a window opening to right and a door opening to left. A single central 2/2 timber sliding sash window to first floor; a single diminutive 1/1 timber sliding sash window to second floor (right reveal aligned with the right reveal of the window below; a top hung casement window to third floor right. East face is abutted by the return of No.19 Clarendon Street; west face not visible at time of survey.

Setting:
No's 17, 19 and 21 Clarendon Street are distinctive in character and were the last properties to have been built in this terrace of twelve predominately brick faced townhouses. Located within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, the front of the property faces north and is bounded by Clarendon Street set behind a low rendered wall surmounted by replacement metal railings.

Materials:
Roof Natural Slate
Rainwater goods Cast Iron
Walling Render/Brick
Windows Timber

Historical information

Clarendon Street, characterised by its long terraces of gentlemen’s townhouses, was laid out in the early-Victorian period with the construction of the first dwellings commencing in c. 1853. The laying out of similar terraced dwellings on Great James Street and Queen Street was necessitated by a period of growth in the economy and population of Londonderry that occurred in the mid-19th century. John Hume notes that during the period 1825-1850 ‘reconstruction of the city’s buildings [within the city walls] took place alongside the development for the first time of housing outside the walls at Bogside and Edenballymore’ (Hume, p. 147).

The first edition of the Ordnance Survey maps (1830) for the townland of Edenballymore records that the Clarendon Street area was originally rural hinterland with few significant structures; in 1830 the development of the city’s streets had extended no further than Waterloo Place, Abbey Street and William Street. In the first decades of the 19th century the only major construction north of the walls had been isolated buildings such as the Londonderry Infirmary, the Lunatic Asylum and Foyle College (HB01/22/016) with little or no domestic architecture being erected in the same period. The only building in the area that predates the early-Victorian development is Foyle Cottage (HB01/21/006), a Regency house that was constructed c. 1815 and which, according to Calley, is ‘a pleasing composition which offers a gentle rebuke to some of the exuberance of later nearby buildings … one of it’s pleasant features is that it opens a gap in the long terraces’ (Calley, p. 116).

In The Annals of Derry, a survey of the city compiled by Robert Simpson and published in 1847, Simpson recorded that ‘all the district now covered by Great James’s Street, William Street, Little James Street … and the numerous lanes in that vicinity [originally comprised] meadow ground without a house’ (Simpson, p. 213). The initial development of housing in this area began in the late-Georgian period and continued into the Victorian era; with the construction of uniform rows of neat and charming three-storey townhouses, a new affluent area was established that swiftly became the residence of the city’s merchant and professional classes. The laying out of Clarendon Street, Great James Street and Queen Street followed a geometric street pattern which was characteristic of Georgian street development; the development signified the most ambitious project of town planning carried out in Londonderry since the construction of the walled city in the 1613-19.

The contemporary 1847 plan of Londonderry, which depicted the proposed layout of Clarendon Street at least a decade before it was actually completed, recorded that the street was originally known as Ponsonby Street. The street was named after the Rt. Rev. Richard Ponsonby (1772-1853), Bishop of Derry and Raphoe, however by the 1850s the street had been renamed Clarendon Street in honour of the Fourth Earl of Clarendon, George Villiers (1800-1870), Lord Lieutenant of Ireland between 1847 and 1852. The second edition of the Ordnance Survey map records that Ponsonby Street had been renamed Clarendon Street by at least 1853. Although the 1847 plan of Londonderry depicted that Clarendon Street extended from the quay up to Francis Street, only the bottom section of Clarendon Street (between the Strand Road and Queen Street) had been laid out by 1853.

The development of Clarendon Street progressed slowly throughout the 1850s; by 1856 Griffith’s Valuation recorded that only nine dwellings had been constructed along the entire length of the street. Mullin records that development of the remainder of the street did not recommence until the mid-1850s. In 1851 Skipton & Miller had advertised building ground on Clarendon Street, Queen Street and Patrick Street to be let in perpetuity; this was followed by a second drive in 1856 when additional leases were advertised for building ground on the northern side of Clarendon Street (Mullin, p. 117).

Nos 17-21 Clarendon Street were constructed in 1874, approximately two decades after the initial development of the street; as a result the three buildings display a Victorian character in contrast to the neighbouring Georgian-style terraces (which were also constructed in the Victorian period). Nos 17-21 Clarendon Street were constructed for Forrest Reid, a local solicitor who held business offices on Richmond Street (Ulster Town Directories); the Annual Revisions note that No. 21 was originally valued at £32 in 1874. Throughout its history the occupants of Clarendon Street were of the city’s merchant and professional classes. In 1901 No. 21 was occupied by Alexander Craig, a mechanical engineer whose business, A. & G. Craig, operated from premises on Queen’s Quay; in that year the census building return described the house as a 2nd class dwelling that consisted of eight rooms and possessed a stable and coach house as its rear outbuildings. Ownership of No. 21 remained with the Reid family by 1931 but by 1935 nos 19-21 Clarendon Street had been purchased by a Mr. Joseph A. L. Johnston. In 1935 the house was increased in value to £49 under the First Revaluation. By the Second Revaluation (1956-72) the house was owned by a Dr. F. W. Craig who converted the ground and first floors into a private medical surgery, whilst the upper floors were retained as a number of domestic apartments. By the cancellation of the revaluation in 1972 the total value of No. 21 Clarendon Street stood at £98.

In 1978 the Department of the Environment designated Clarendon Street (and the surrounding streets) a Conservation Area ‘being an area of special architectural or historic interest, the character of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance’ (Londonderry Clarendon Street Conservation Area Booklet). No. 21 Clarendon Street was subsequently listed in 1979. The NIEA HB Records note that the roof of the building was reslated in natural slate in 1987 and that the windows of the building were replaced after being broken by a bomb explosion in 1992 (NIEA HB Records).

In 2013 Calley described nos 17-21 Clarendon Street as ‘terrace houses, being a variation on the other houses on the street … the fenestration somewhat irregular [whilst] the outer buildings have tripartite ground floor windows and the ground of each is rendered’ (Calley, p. 117). Few of the mid-Victorian townhouses along Clarendon Street are now occupied as residential dwellings; the majority of the three-storey buildings were converted into offices for local dentist, solicitors and accountancy firms in the late-20th century; No. 21 Clarendon Street continues to be utilised as office premises.

References

Primary Sources
1. PRONI OS/6/5/20/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1830)
2. PRONI OS/6/5/20/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1853)
3. PRONI VAL/2/B/5/16G – Griffith’s Valuation (1856)
4. PRONI VAL/12/B/32/11B-ZA – Annual Revisions (1862-1897)
5. PRONI VAL/12/B/33/2C-2F – Annual Revisions (1898-1931)
6. PRONI VAL/3/B/6/4 – First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland (1935)
7. PRONI VAL/4/B/5/13 – Second General Revaluation of Northern Ireland (1956-72)
8. Robert Simpson’s ‘Annals of Derry’ (1847)
9. O’Hagan’s plan of Londonderry (1847)
10. Census of Ireland (1901 / 1911)
11. Ulster Town Directories (1843-1918)
12. PRONI Wills Catalogue (24 Feb 1888)
13. First Survey Record – HB01/21/005 (1970)
14. First Survey Image – HB01/21/005 (No Date)
15. NIEA HB Records – HB01/21/005

Secondary Sources

1. Calley, D., ‘City of Derry: An historical gazetteer to the buildings of Londonderry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 2013.
2. Ferguson, W. S; Rowan, A. J; Tracey, J. J., ‘List of historic buildings, groups of buildings, areas of architectural importance in and near the city of Derry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1970.
3. Hume, J., ‘Derry beyond the walls: Social and economic aspects of the growth of Derry 1825-1850’ Belfast: Ulster Historical Foundation, 2002.
4. Mullin, T. H., Ulster’s Historic City: Derry – Londonderry’ Coleraine: Coleraine Bookshop, 1986.
5. Rowan, A. J., ‘The Buildings of Ireland: North West Ulster’ London: Yale University Press, 2003.
6. ‘Londonderry Clarendon Street Conservation Area Booklet’ Department of the Environment, 1978.
7. ‘Design Guide for Clarendon Street Conservation Area’ Department of the Environment, 2012.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest
R. Age
S. Authenticity

Evaluation

A Victorian mid-terrace two-bay three-storey with attic render and brick townhouse, built in 1874 along with Nos. 17 & 19 Clarendon Street (HB01/21/005 G & H). It has group value with Nos. 5-19 and 23-73 (excluding No.53) which were built over a twenty-one year period and line the south side of the street. No's 17, 19 and 21 Clarendon Street are distinctive in character and were the last properties to have been built in this terrace of twelve predominately brick faced townhouses. The conversion to office use and the internal linking of the property with No. 23 has resulted in some modernisation of the interior. Despite this, its original character and much of its detailing survives. Located within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, the well preserved setting adds to its interest. The terrace represents the mid 19th century development of the city of Derry and the house is a noteworthy example of the type of property built during this period of growth in the economy and population of the city.

General comments

Additional listing criteria apply - R-Age & S-Authenticity