Northern Bank

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Uncompromisingly stark and modern, two storey, cube-like bank building of 1970 by Ferguson and McIlveen with attached (but set back) two storey gabled former manager’s house in a more accessible modern style. The bank is set on the NW side of Ann Street (at a bend in the line of the street) with the former manager’s house tucked in behind beyond a small railed off forecourt.

The asymmetrical front elevation faces roughly SE and consists of a high wall façade dominated by a 5 panel window ensemble with concrete surround and concrete mullions, tall windows between with ribbed top and bottom infill spandrels. Rhythm is broken by usual bank automatic dispensers. Tucked into one corner of wall an entrance with flat canopy over, which crosses the open space of the forecourt to abut No. 28. Supported on slim steel columns. Wall is faced with stone slabs of Westmoreland slate. Above the entrance the bank name is applied in block letters.

The NE elevation faces into the forecourt and is blank. To the SW the building is abutted by the neighbouring property. The rear elevation is finished in a dry dash and has five narrow high level windows of differing heights. The building has a flat roof (whose covering could not be seen).

The (former) manager’s house extends at a from the NE corner of the bank. It is a two storey split-level gabled building in brown brick and dry dash with a pan-tile covered roof and various sized large windows with modern frames, In plan form it is irregular with a ‘kink’ towards the SW end. To the rear of the house is a high level garden, so that from this side the property appears as single storey.

Historical information

This bank was built in 1970 to designs by the firm of Ferguson & McIlveen for the newly established Northern Bank- an amalgamation of the former Northern Banking Co. and the Belfast Banking Co.. Previous to this the Ballycastle branch of the Northern Banking Co. had occupied premises in Market Street custom built in 1863, moving to there from a property in Ann Street. The Belfast Banking Co. established a branch in the town in 1918, occupying the building now belonging to the local Credit Union.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL/2B/1/28c Second valuation, Ramoan parish, 1859
2 PRONI VAL/12B/2/3a-g Annual valuation revision books, Ballycastle ED, 1864-1921
3 ‘Slater’s Royal National Commercial Directory of Ireland (Manchester, 1870)
4 PRONI VAL/12E/8/1/1-3 Valuation plan of Ballycastle, 1898-c.1935
5 PRONI VAL/12E/8/2/1 Valuation plan of Ballycastle, c.1905
6 PRONI VAL/12B/2/5a-c Annual valuation revision books, Ballycastle UD, 1921-31
7 PRONI VAL/3G/6/1/1-3 Valuation plan of Ballycastle, 1934-50
8 PRONI VAL/3B/1/5 First general revaluation of Northern Ireland, Ballycastle UD, 1935
9 PRONI VAL/3C/1/6 First general revaluation of Northern Ireland, 1936-57
10 PRONI VAL/4B/1/12 Second general revaluation of Northern Ireland, 1957-72

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Uncompromisingly stark and modern, two storey, cube-like bank building of 1970 by Ferguson and McIlveen with attached (but set back) two storey gabled former manager’s house in a more accessible modern style. This building stands in complete contrast to the what is basically a late Georgian / Victorian street.