28 Clarendon Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Mid-Victorian end-of-terrace two-bay three-storey with attic red brick Georgian-style townhouse, built in1862. Rectangular on plan with projecting return to rear and attached two storey mews building. Principal elevation faces south set behind a sloping low rendered plinth wall with capping stones surmounted by replacement cast iron railings. Built as part of a terrace row of similar houses of this type lining the north side of Clarendon Street.

Pitched natural slate roof, black clay ridge tiles to main roof and return. Slender red brick chimney stack rising from the east side, centred on ridge with seven terracotta pots. Cast iron half-round guttering on rise and fall brackets and circular downpipe to front and rear elevation.

Principal south (front) elevation is of Flemish bond brick to upper floor levels and smooth render to ground floor level; window openings are square-headed with 6/6 timber sliding sashes set within painted cement rendered reveals and painted sills. Three-centred arched opening with moulded surround to entrance doorway with moulded architrave and entablature supported by a pair of columns of the Doric order and Adam-style fanlight above a four-panelled timber door. Ground floor openings have moulded plaster surrounds with vermiculated keystone and shoulder-course between openings; continuous rendered sill course to first floor windows with approx. 0.5m wide cement rendered strip to right from first floor sill course to eaves. Two diminished windows to right of door with two windows to first and second floors (those to upper floors are not aligned with ground floor openings).

Gable (east) elevation is cement rendered surmounted by a single large red brick chimney stack with seven terracotta pots. Single 6/6 timber sliding sash window to far left to first and second floors with a single diminutive single pane casement window to attic level to far left.

Rear (north) elevation is three-storey with attic dormer to left and a three-storey return to right built at half landing height stepping down to a further two-storey extension which abuts a two-storey mews building to the rear of the site. All finished in red brick except for cement rendered ground floor level, approx. 0.4m wide cement rendered strip to left of main block from first floor level to eaves and cement rendered mews building.
Single 6/6 timber sliding sash to left bay to first and second floor surmounted by a 6/3 timber sliding sash to slated dormer (single ground floor opening not fully visible at time of survey). Rear return to right is surmounted by a single 3/3 timber window.

Three-storey portion of east face of rear return is two bay (left bay slightly recessed) comprising multi-pane steel casement window to first floor left surmounted by a bipartite (1/1, 1/1) timber sliding sash window and a 6/6 timber sliding sash window to right to first and second floor (that to second floor is slightly diminished in height); stainless steel flue rises between the two bays and terminates above eaves level. The flue obscures a diminutive square fixed pane window at first floor level; ground floor not visible at time of survey. Two-storey portion of east face of rear return is two bay and comprises a single 6/6 timber sliding sash window to first floor level of each bay; ground floor not visible at time of survey. Exposed north gable of three-storey portion of rear return is blank. North face of rear return abuts mews building. West face of rear return not visible at time of survey.

West side of main block is abutted by adjoining property No. 30 Clarendon Street (HB01/22/022L).

Two-storey mews building to the rear of the site is at right angles to the rear return. South face is abutted by the rear return to left, right bay is blank to first floor level; ground floor level not visible at time of survey.
East (gable) elevation is symmetrical and has a single 2/2 timber sliding sash window to each floor.
North face has a 1/1 timber sliding sash window to first floor right.
West face is abutted by mews building of No. 30 Clarendon Street (HB01/22/022L).

Setting:
Built as part of a row of eleven similar Georgian-style, early to mid-Victorian townhouses which line the north side of Clarendon Street. The front of the property is bounded by Clarendon Street set behind a low rendered plinth wall with replacement cast iron railings enclosing a small hard surfaced area. To the east of the site is a rough cast high boundary wall with timber sheeted door opening. The wall extends along Princes Street enclosing a rear yard. To the north end of the site is a two-storey pitched roof mews building. A laneway runs along the rear of the mews building providing access to the rest of the terrace.

Materials:
Roof Natural Slate
RWG Cast Iron
Walling Brick/Render
Windows Timber/Steel

Historical information

Clarendon Street, characterised by its long terraces of Georgian-style 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 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 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 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 years 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 Ponsoby 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. 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. Griffith’s Valuation recorded that only nine dwellings had been constructed along the entire length of the street by 1856. In that year additional leases were advertised for building ground on the northern side of Clarendon Street (Mullin, p. 117).

No. 28 was constructed as part of the second phase in the laying out of Clarendon Street. No. 28 was built, together with the adjoining nos 30-36 Clarendon Street, in 1862 for John Allen, a wine merchant and property owner who held business premises on Linenhall Street (Ulster Town Directories). The three-storey house was originally valued at £25 and was occupied by a Ms. Thompson in 1862. Throughout its history the occupants of Clarendon Street were of the city’s merchant and professional classes. In 1901 No. 28 Clarendon Street was occupied by William McCandless, a local magistrate and merchant. The census of that year described the house as a 1st class dwelling that consisted of ten main rooms. No. 28 Clarendon Street continued to be owned by the Allen family until the 1930s when the building passed to a Ms. Maude V. Keyes (who also owned the adjoining No. 30). The First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1935) increased the value of No. 28 to £52. By the Second Revaluation (1956-72) the former dwelling had been converted into a nurses home for the Northern Ireland Hospital Authority who had purchased the building. In 1962 the building was returned to its original use as a private dwelling. By the end of the Second Revaluation the value of No. 28 stood at £44.

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. 28 Clarendon Street was subsequently listed in 1979. The NIEA HB Records note No. 28 was converted from a dwelling into offices for the Solicitors firm McDaid, McCullough and Moore in 1990. The firm also possessed the adjoining No. 30 and both properties were united into a single office in 1992 (NIEA HB Records).

In 2013 Calley described nos 6-48 Clarendon Street as a ‘delightfully long red brick terrace of the mid-19th century … the buildings are nearly all the same, being three-and-a-half-storey, two-bay with most ground floors rather inelegantly squeezing in a doorway with two reduced scale window bays … depressed arched recessed timber-framed doorways have simple segmented fanlights and thin Doric columns supporting entablatures’ (Calley, p. 114). 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 dentists, solicitors and accountancy firms in the late-20th century. No. 28 Clarendon Street continues to be occupied by a solicitors office and remains united with the adjoining No. 30.

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 Property in Northern Ireland (1935)
7. PRONI VAL/4/B/5/13 – Second General Revaluation of Property in 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. First Survey Record – HB01/22/022 (No Date)
13. First Survey Image – HB01/22/022 (No Date)
14. NIEA HB Records – HB01/22/022K

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
H-. Alterations detracting from building
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
S. Authenticity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

A end-of-terrace two-bay three-storey with attic red brick Georgian-style townhouse, built in 1862 along with Nos. 30-36 Clarendon Street (HB01/22/022L,M,N&O). It has group value with Nos. 6-26 & 30-48 which were built over an eight year period and line the north side of the street. Although the property is now combined with No. 30 and part of the front facade has been rendered, its original character and much of its detailing survives. Located within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, its mews building and 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