Ice house

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A domestic ice house comprising a short vaulted passage leading to a vaulted oblong chamber built into the side of a hill. Entrance faces east.

Entrance comprises a rubble stone segmental arched opening, roughly shouldered, built into an overgrown earthen bank, and containing a slightly recessed brickwork tympanum over a rectangular doorway without a door. Open doorway leads to a short passage which has a screed-covered cobbled floor; rubble stone walls rising to a semi-circular brick and rubble vaulted roof; rear wall contains a modern rectangular steel barred door on an original rubble stone and modern brick plinth wall, and surmounted by a rubble stone tympanum. Door opens into, and allows view into, a brick lined domical vaulted chamber of circular cross section which drops to well below ground level.

SETTING: The structure is sited within the demesne of Loughgall Manor House, set in a hillside within the gardens, surrounded by trees.

Historical information

Precise date of structure not recorded but it is shown on the OS map of 1908. It does not appear to be marked on the OS maps of 1834 and 1860, but it may be taken to date from the early 19th century, presumably built to serve the new Manor House of c 1840.

References – Primary Sources
1. OS Map 1908, Co Armagh 8.

Secondary Sources
1. DOENI, Loughgall: A Conservation Village (Belfast, 1993), p 5.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest
V. Authorship

Evaluation

This is a good example of a domestic ice house, probably of the early Victorian era, which retains its essential original features and forms an integral part of an important country house demesne.