10-12 Bridge Street,

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A two-storey building with rendered walls and slated roofs, with a battered entrance front and north-east gable meeting at a curved corner, and a gabled front return to the other end. Main entrance faces south-east.

Entrance front: roof of Bangor blue slates in regular courses; corner of eaves to right angled off above curved corner to wall; chimneys smooth rendered, with plain block cornice, old and new pots. Cast iron gutter and downpipe. Wall smooth rendered with traces of lining; pilaster-like strip of channelled blocks to each end, and projecting eaves course; battered face to wall.
Windows are rectangular timber sliding sash, vertically hung, 2 over 2 with horns, and exposed frames, except for one window to ground floor which is a modern rectangular timber fixed light with top-hung vent; windows to first floor are set in moulded stuccoed surrounds with projecting cill, with the projecting eaves course to the head; the sashed windows to ground floor is set in a similar surround, with a key-block; the other window to ground floor is set in plain reveals. Two doorways to ground floor, containing a modern glazed and panelled door to the left, and a modern glazed door to the right, both set in similar moulded surrounds to windows, with key-block.

North-east gable: of asymmetrical form, curved to the left-hand corner, with a battered face; raised smooth cement rendered coping to verges; cast iron downpipe and hopper, with concealed gutter to short flat-roofed portion to right. Wall smooth rendered with quoining to right-hand extremity. One window, small rectangular timber sliding sash, 1 over 1 with horns, with exposed frames, set in a moulded stucco surround with key-block.

Front return block: wall facing north-east has roof of asbestos slates in irregular courses, contained by cement gable coping to left; walls smooth rendered and painted; one window, rectangular timber sliding sash, 1 over 1 with horns, with exposed frame, set in plain reveals. Gable of front return, facing south-east is of similar walling to previous, of plain character, with one window to first floor, modern rectangular timber fixed light with casement and top-hung vent.

South-east elevation: two-storey, comprising the gable of the main block, to the left, with the front return extending to the right. Gable of main block: wall rendered with a dry dash of limestone chippings, with copings of smooth render; smooth rendered chimney on ridge set back from gable; two pots, one old, one new; two windows to ground floor, the one to left sashed as previous to entrance front, 2 over 2 with horns, with painted reveals and concrete cill; window to right, timber fixed light with top-hung vent, connected with door in wing to right, timber, glazed with narrow vertical panes, all modern. Wall of wing to right, that is the front return, smooth rendered and painted; roof of asbestos slates in irregular courses, contained by cement gable coping to right; PVC gutter and downpipe.

Rear elevation: roof of asbestos slates in regular courses ,with a modern rooflight; wall smooth rendered, painted, with one window, rectangular metal casement; PVC gutter and downpipe, with downpipe crudely returning across face of wall.

SETTING: The building stands within the built-up area of the village, at one end of a terrace of three houses, facing along Bridge Street, but set back form it with a small hard-standing, used for car-parking, outside the front entrance. A narrow lane runs past the gable of the front return to adjacent properties. Immediately at the rear is a small concrete yard shared with 2-4 Waterfall Road, bounded by a basalt rubble wall to the south-west; yard entered by rendered walling to the south-east, containing a pair of large double doors, steel sheeted.

Historical information

The building occupies the site of, and may incorporate parts of, an old corn-mill, from which the name of the locality 'Mill Tenement' is derived. The precise date of the building is not known but it appears in its present block form on the OS map of 1832, standing on its own, when, however, it was apparently only one storey high, and thatched; raised to two storeys and slated by 1859; on the OS map of 1857 it was shown with neighbouring buildings attached on the north-west side. The mill ceased operating sometime prior to 1903, and has been converted, in turn, into a butcher's shop, and a dwelling house, with no original machinery or original mill features remaining.

References – Primary Sources
1. OS Map 1832, Co Antrim 25.
2. OS Map 1857, Co Antrim 25.

Secondary Sources
1. UAHS, Glens of Antrim (Belfast, 1971), pp 20 and 21.
2. IHR 6618.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

This is a building of at least 19th century date which has undergone various remodellings due to changes of function, from origins as a corn-mill to present day house, and has lost a number of original features, which have resulted in it being of negligible industrial archaeological interest, containing no mill machinery, and of little architectural interest.