Ulster Bank

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A three-storey three-bay red-brick Ulster Bank, built 1904 to designs by Lepper and Fennell and located to the west side of Bridge Street in Banbridge town centre. Rectangular plan with lower two-storey return and annexe to rear.

Hipped natural slate roof with red-brick chimneystacks having sandstone caps and five pots. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods on dentilled eaves. Walling is Flemish-bonded red-brick with sandstone dressings and quoins to upper floors; channelled ashlar sandstone to ground floor on a rock-faced feather-edged granite plinth. Windows are 1/1 timber-framed sash with brick jack arches and sandstone keyblocks; segmental-headed to ground and second floor. Those to second floor have sandstone sills on corbel brackets; pedimented central window to first floor.

The principal elevation faces east and is three openings wide at each floor. Ground floor has four Ionic columns on granite pedestal-piers flanking openings and is surmounted by a plain entablature with applied lettering reading “ULSTER BANK LIMITED” to frieze. To left is a twelve-paned red-wood timber door with brass door furniture and tall segmental-headed transom light.

The south elevation is abutted by an adjoining building; top section is blank.

The west elevation is fully abutted by the lower two-storey return. Return is brick over granite plinth with flush sandstone eaves course and sill course. Variety of fenestration to north elevation including a tripartite transom and mullioned window to ground and first floor left; that to ground floor has sill on corbel brackets. Ground floor window at left has a decorative balustrade apron set into plinth; above is a carved sandstone plaque depicting the Ulster Bank emblem. To far left is a twelve-panelled timber door with segmental-headed transom light accessed by a single bull-nosed granite step; louvered openings to plinth with segmental-headed label mould with keystone.

The north elevation of the main block has four evenly-spaced windows at each floor.

Setting

Prominently sited at the junction of Bridge Street and Victoria Street in Banbridge town centre; street-fronted at a gradient. To rear is a small yard having former motor house and red-brick outbuilding. Bounded to south by a tall rubble stone wall. Car-park to western end of Victoria Street.

Roof: Natural slate
Walling: brick/sandstone
Windows: timber
RWG: Cast-iron

Historical information

The Ulster Bank’s new branch at Banbridge was built in 1904/5 to designs by Lepper and Fennell of Belfast. Both the Northern and Ulster Banks completed new branches in Banbridge in the opening decade of the twentieth century, demonstrating the commercial expansion of the time. (Irish Builder) The bank is first shown, uncaptioned, on the fourth edition OS map of 1903-18.

The Ulster Banking Company commenced business in Belfast on 1st July 1836, at which time arrangements for the opening of a number of branches, including Banbridge, were nearly completed. Banbridge was then a highly significant centre of the linen trade, and as a prosperous and expanding town was an obvious location for a branch in the early nineteenth century. The first Ulster Bank branch opened on 1st January 1837. Robert Boyd was the manager and John Scott was engaged as a learner, salary first year nothing, second year £20, third year £30. Boyd died in 1846 and was replaced by Richard P McKee former pro-manager at the branch. When he died in 1879 he was recorded as the oldest officer in the bank, having entered the service in 1836 some weeks before the bank opened for public business. (Knox)

The first office of the Bank was in Newry Street and c1846 new premises were obtained on the west side of Bridge Street where the bank remained until the volume of business made a new branch necessary. A suitable site became available, also in Bridge Street, and tenders were opened in January of 1904 for the new building. The architects were Messrs Lepper & Fennell of Waring Street, Belfast and quantities were prepared by W H Stephens & Son, Donegall Square North. Lepper & Fennell carried out various works for the Ulster bank between 1900 and 1905 including another new branch in York Street, Belfast. (www.dia.ie) The branch opened for business on 22nd June 1905. As was usual for banking houses at this period, the building was constructed with accommodation for the manager who lived on the premises. (Knox; Irish Builder)

The building entered valuation records in 1906 as a ‘Manager’s house, bank office, yard and small garden’ valued at £120 and replacing a pair of earlier houses on the site. The valuer noted that the building was part rented for £10 per annum and part purchased for £400. The cost of construction had been £4,000. The manager’s accommodation comprised on the ground floor, a kitchen, scullery, pantry ‘lift pantry’ coal store and WC. The first floor comprised a dining room, drawing room, breakfast room, bathroom and WC, two bedrooms and a pantry. On the second floor were two bedrooms and a maid’s bedroom. The 1911 census lists the resident branch manager at the time, John Alexander, who lived at the bank with his wife and three young children. The family employed a governess from Dublin and a general domestic servant.

A motor house was added to the plot in 1931 and the valuation was consequently raised to £138. In the First General Revaluation of 1933/4 the valuation was raised again to £155. The manager’s accommodation is again listed and the valuer notes the ‘large and well fitted public office (counter and fittings in mahogany, the manager’s private office, strong room and lavatory accommodation at the front’. The living accommodation was at the rear and over the bank and could be entered from the bank or by a separate entrance in a side street. The bank was ‘very substantially built...Imposing elevation in ashlar stone and red brick. All in first class condition’ but the valuer also noted that ‘The site is rather narrow and owing to difficulty of lighting there is much waste space in excessively large landings &c in dwelling portion’ and that the kitchen and dining rooms were on different floors.

Dimensions and a plan are given showing a three-storey public office and dwelling to the front with a two-storey extension to the rear containing the stairs and strong-room. Further two-storey and single-storey returns to the rear contained kitchen, scullery and pantry and outbuildings in the yard included a WC and coal store and the garage which had been added in 1931.

The bank buildings were modernised in 1961 and the building remains in use as a branch of the Ulster Bank. (Knox) Brett calls the building ‘a modest but not unpleasing academic exercise in the classical manner’.

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/27/4 Fourth Edition OS Map 1903-18
2. PRONI VAL/12/B/16/8A-C Annual Revisions (1899-1930)
3. PRONI VAL/12/F/4/1/1 Annual Revisions (1930-35)
4. PRONI VAL/12/A/3/12 – Valuer’s Notebook 1906
5. PRONI VAL/3/D/4/2/B/2 First General Revaluation (1933-57)
6. PRONI VAL/3/C/4/4 First General Revaluation (1936-57)
7. 1911 census online
8. Irish Builder Vol 46, 16 Jan 1904, p40
9. Irish Builder Vol 46, 30 Jan 1904, p54

Secondary Sources

1. Brett, C.E.B., Dunleath, Lady “List of Historic Buildings, Groups of Buildings, Buildings of Architectural Importance in Borough of Banbridge” Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, April-July 1969
2. Knox, W.J. “Decades of the Ulster Bank, 1836-1964” Belfast: Ulster Bank Ltd, 1965
3. www.dia.ie

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest
V. Authorship

Evaluation

A three-storey three-bay red-brick Ulster Bank, built 1904 to designs by Lepper and Fennell. Detailing and historic fabric survive and are of good quality, exhibiting a robust character appropriate to the type. A good example of an early twentieth-century Ulster Bank in the favoured classical style demonstrating the continuing growth of Ulster Bank Ltd and the expansion and prosperity of Banbridge at the turn of the twentieth century. The building is of interest in the context of bank architecture in Northern Ireland.