1 Hayes Park

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Semi-detached two-bay one-and-a-half-storey concrete block house, built c.1915. Built as one of a pair within a cul-de-sac of 28 similar houses designed by William Larmour. Located on the east side of Lurgan Road opposite the former Seapatrick Mills and laid out as a garden village with a winding bitmac road.

Hipped roof with diagonally laid synthetic tiles and terracotta ridge tiles. Three rendered chimneystacks with shaped coping and terracotta ridge pots. Single gabled dormer to front pitch having timber bargeboard and applied timber work. Exposed timber rafter feet to overhanging eaves throughout, timber bargeboards and cast-iron rainwater goods. Rock-face moulded concrete block walling with projecting concrete plinth course. Square-headed window openings with flush concrete lintels, flush concrete splayed sills and original multi-pane timber casement windows.

Two-bay front south elevation with projecting one-and-half-storey gabled projection and recessed entrance porch. Tripartite window openings to the upper floor with a three-sided canted bay to the ground floor of the projecting gable. Square-headed door opening with flush concrete lintel and sheeted, panelled and glazed timber door with rectangular overlight and bipartite window opening, as per above. Door opens into recessed open porch having timber sheeted ceiling, concrete paved floor and single concrete step to the front garden.

West elevation is three windows wide with the north half having a one-and-half-storey gable. Bipartite window openings to the ground floor, tripartite to the upper level of the gable, detailed as per above.

Single-bay rear elevation with catslide dormer having tripartite timber casement window. Bipartite window to the ground floor and square-headed door opening with replacement multi-paned timber glazed door. Rear elevation abutted by a single-storey L-plan projection having red tiled roof, rock-face moulded concrete block wall construction and timber doors and windows as per rear elevation.

East side elevation abutted by adjoining house.

Setting

Located in a cul-de-sac of 28 similar houses on the east side of Lurgan Road laid out as a garden village. This house is one of the more visible to the main road enclosed by rock-face moulded concrete block wall with concrete coping and having separate access from the Lurgan Road via pair of steel gates. Large landscaped front lawn and gravel rear yard.

Roof Red synthetic tile
RWG Cast-iron
Walling moulded concrete block
Windows Timber

Historical information

Hayes Park is a development of twenty-eight semi-detached dwellings built by F W Hayes & Co, the proprietors of Seapatrick Spinning Mills. The houses were built between 1912 and 1919 to designs by William Larmour and are first shown on the fourth edition OS map of 1903-18, captioned ‘Hayes’ Park’. Nos 1 and 2 date from 1915.

The first eight houses, corresponding to numbers 15-22, enter valuation records in 1912 with numbers 23 and 24 added in 1913 and numbers 25 to 28 in 1914, all valued at £4. A further 14 houses were added in an adjacent plot between 1915 and 1919, numbers 1-2 in 1915, 3-6 in 1917, 7-12 in 1918 and 13-14 in 1919. As at ‘Seapatrick Villas’ further to the north, the larger houses with a higher valuation were built next to the main road. Number 1 was valued at £7.5s and number 2 at £6.5s, while the adjacent houses at numbers 13 and 14 were valued at £5 and £6. All the other dwellings in Hayes Park had a valuation of £4.

Valuer’s notes give a plan of numbers one and two showing a small rear extension and giving the construction materials as concrete block and asbestos tiles. The rent for number 1 was 5d per week and for number 2, 4s.6d per week and this included electric light which was provided by the company. The houses had cost £650-700 to build. By the 1930s the inhabitants were paying the low rent of 7s.6d per week and the accommodation comprised, two receptions, three bedrooms, a kitchen, scullery and outside WC.

The houses were said to be ‘English-style’ and were dwellings that carried a certain amount of status, being intended for foremen rather than the ordinary workers. (Young and Quail) The plans for the estate were prepared by William Larmour of Banbridge who is said to have been inspired by an idea put forward by ‘one of the Barbour ladies of Hilden’ (Moore)

In 1834 Frederick William Hayes built weaving sheds on glebe land near Seapatrick Church, later converting the mill to linen thread production under the name ‘Royal Irish Linen Threads’. On the death of Frederick the business was taken over by his son William Hayes who began a programme of house building, putting up terraces of workers’ housing on Kilpike Road and a short terrace of management houses facing onto the Lurgan Road c1865. The next phase of house building associated with the factory took place around 1890 when a red-brick terrace of management houses, known as Milfort Terrace, was erected on the Lurgan Road, opposite Seapatrick Rectory, followed by a red-brick terrace of workers’ housing (Bannview Terrace). (Moore) The eight semi-detached dwellings at ‘Seapatrick Villas’ were built in 1908/9 and together with the housing built in Hayes Park in the 1910s were influenced by the concept of garden cities or villages which was then current. The idea of the garden city grew out of the desire of paternalistic industrialists to provide ideal spacious conditions for their workforce with low density housing surrounded by green spaces. (Ward) The houses continue in use as domestic dwellings.

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/27/4 Fourth Edition OS Map 1903-18
2. PRONI VAL/12/B/16/6A-H Annual Revisions (1864-1929)
3. PRONI VAL/12/A/3/8 Valuation Notes 1915
4. PRONI VAL/3/D/4/3/L/3– First General Revaluation (1933-57)
5. 1911 census online

Secondary Sources

1. Moore, TA “Thread making at Seapatrick” (available at raymondscountydownwebsite.net)
2. Ward, S V ed “The Garden City: Past, Present and Future” Alexandrine Press, Oxford, 1992
3. Young, A F and Quail, D “Old Banbridge” Stenlake Publishing, 2002

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Semi-detached two-bay one-and-a-half-storey house, built c.1915. Built as one of a pair (HB17/04/028A&B) in a cul-de-sac of 28 similar houses designed by William Larmour. Located opposite the former Seapatrick Mills and laid out as a garden village with a winding road. Hayes Park is an unusual example of a garden village, built to accommodate the workers of Seapatrick Mills. This house is one of the best preserved in the estate. Although of interest as an early twentieth-century example of suburban design, these houses are not among the best examples of the type and most have been degraded by changes. As a whole, they do not meet the statutory and policy tests as buildings of special architectural or historic interest.