Glencar, 35 Newry Road, Banbridge, Co Down, BT32 3HP

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A two-storey four-bay detached house in a loose interpretation of the Domestic-Revival style, built 1908 and located on a large mature site to the west side of Newry Road in Banbridge. Irregular plan form, basically rectangular with projections to all sides; projecting asymmetrical gabled box bay and one single-storey and one two storey extension (later) to rear.

Pitched and hipped rosemary tile roof with replaced terracotta ridge and hip tiles, some leaded hips and plain bargeboards to gables; rendered chimneystacks having dentiled concrete caps and reclaimed clay pots. Aluminium gutters, with uPVC downpipes (a single cast-iron downpipe remains) descending from overhanging eaves with (later) roughcast soffits. Walling is English garden wall-bonded red-brick to ground floor and painted roughcast render to first floor; southwest elevation has shingled asbestos tiles to first floor gable. Variety of metal and timber casement windows with replacement concrete and some original masonry sills, some with replacement leaded-and-stained glass panels to upper sections. Some windows replaced in recent times with uPVC, to rear and side elevations as noted below.

The principal elevation faces southeast and is dominated by an asymmetrical gabled bay having recessed open segmental-arched porch to left, large Penta partite multi-pane window to first and ground floor right; diminutive two pane casement window to first floor left; slightly recessed tiled recess detail to apex; left cheek blank, right cheek not viewed. Porch is laid with replaced terracotta tiles and has half-panelled timber door with leaded-and-stained glass panels, square-headed over light and sidelights (tripartite at left and single-paned at right and flat-panelled aprons). Replacement doorbell. Left bay has quadripartite multi-paned window to each floor, which to ground floor contained beneath a lean-to rosemary tiled canopy supported on a brick pier to left. The canopy is enclosed to left of pier and is partially glazed with inserted bipartite multi-pane window on brick plinth; panelled and-glazed timber door to right cheek, single (left) and bipartite (right) multi-pane windows to left cheek. To right of gabled bay is a slender multi-pane window to each floor; right bay is set back and lower and has a bipartite multi-pane window to first and a tripartite multi-pane window to ground floor.

The southwest elevation is abutted to ground floor by a projecting single-storey bay with half-hipped roof, lit by two round windows with cills; central chimney breast to first floor flanked by two windows.

The northwest (rear) elevation has a two-storey hipped return to centre which is then abutted by a single-storey brick return. Chimney to single storey rear return has been re-built and is plain in comparison to original chimneystacks to main house. On right side of return is a multi-paned window to both ground and first floor levels, and a projecting box bay to ground floor right with a timber multi-paned window. There is an oriel window on the south-west face of the rear return with a replacement uPVC multi-paned window and pumice stone aggregate concrete cill. To left of rear return there are two further uPVC windows to first floor and ground floor level is abutted by a small, more recent flat-roof extension with skylight. Two storey returns have been infilled c1970 by flat-roofed section comprising utility to ground floor and bathroom above. Rear yard is enclosed by a red-brick wall with replacement timber-sheeted gate opening to northeast.

The northeast elevation has two quadripartite multi-pane windows of different designs to ground floor; tripartite multi-pane window to first floor left, bipartite uPVC window to first floor right. Window to left is timber and window to right is uPVC.

Setting:
Set on a large mature site on the west side of Newry Road in Banbridge. Large lawned garden to front with a variety of mature trees and shrubbery. Curved tarmacadamed driveway (former original red-brick gate piers with coping stones and original metal gates removed). There is a detached part timber-framed, panelled garage with asbestos tiled roof, replacement decorative timber apex and timber bargeboards on north side of main house, in keeping with the style of the main house. Doors have been sensitively replaced. Latch-gate to south west and stone-edged pond to rear garden, re-built in recent years. Variety of other cold frame structures and outhouses of a later date located within gardens.

Rear entrance from Old Newry Road is located between Nos 23 & 25 Old Newry Road and has a modern timber gate and fencing to road. To right side of rear entrance is Glencar Cottage, 25 Old Newry Road (1910), a single storey dwelling with hipped fibre-cement roof.

Roof: Rosemary tile
Walling: Brick / later applied roughcast render
Windows: Metal / timber/ uPVC
RWG: Aluminium/uPVC/Cast-iron

Historical information

‘Glencar’ is first shown, captioned, on the fourth edition OS map of 1903-18, occupying a plot of land on what was then the outskirts of Banbridge. The house first appears in the valuation records in 1908 with the valuer noting that the building was ‘in progress’. It appears to have been completed by 1909, at which point it was valued at £42, later lowered to £40 on appeal. The contemporary valuers’ notebook states that the cost of construction was £800. This notebook also contains a plan and dimensions of the new building, and from the latter it would seem that the section with circular windows to the southwest elevation, (now part of the living room), replaced a single-storey glass-roofed conservatory which originally extended along this facade. The valuers state that the house was built with 'cavity walls'. The 1909 plan also shows outbuildings including a garage, greenhouse and tool house.

The property was built by Robert Allingham (d.1937), the County Leitrim-born founder of boot merchants Allingham & Co. of North Street (and later of Donegall Place and Ann Street), Belfast, and his wife, Sarah Elizabeth. The name of the property is doubtless a reference to Robert’s Leitrim origins. In the 1911 census the couple are noted as living there with a boarder, 30-year-old Lizzie Dickson, whilst the building itself is noted as a ‘1st class’ house with eleven rooms in occupation.

The Allinghams put Glencar up for sale in late 1917, the newspaper notice describing it as a ‘delightfully artistic villa…built by the owner…regardless of expense…containing 2 sitting rooms, 3 bedrooms, large kitchen, extra-large scullery, large bathroom, cloak and box room, 2 conservatories, motor garage etc.’, whilst the grounds were ‘beautifully laid out and planted with the very choicest shrubs’, with a ‘well-stocked vegetable garden and orchard in full bearing’. It was subsequently occupied by David Towell (1919) and William J Warren [?or Warner] (1922); however, the ownership appears to have remained in the Allingham family and Robert Allingham was again the occupier in 1927.

In the early 1930s valuation book, the accommodation is noted as comprising - on the ground floor - a central hall and two good receptions, a back lobby, cloakroom and separate WC, small study, good kitchen and combined scullery pantry with a small maid’s bedroom over the scullery. Outside was a washhouse with hot and cold water supply. The enclosed yard contained a coal store and garage. On the first floor were two front bedrooms fitted with lavatory basins, one back bedroom, a bath and separate WC. All the main rooms had central heating. The valuer commented that the house was ‘of very attractive appearance standing well back in extensive grounds, well built and expensively finished but bedroom accommodation inadequate for class of house’. The house was revalued at £59 in the First General Revaluation of 1936.

The ‘superior…artistically built…and beautifully situated villa’ was advertised for sale again in 1933. It was acquired before 1935 by Thomas J Gibson, a surgeon. The property was advertised for sale by Gibson in summer 1946 and, (in a strange twist of fate given the profession of its original owner), was subsequently acquired by the footwear manufacturers Down Shoes Ltd, as the residence for their managing director, Tom Hooper. Down Shoes had established a factory further south along the Newry Road in 1947, and eventually became one of the largest employers in the Banbridge area, remaining in business until 2002. Glencar was sold again to the present owner’s family in late 1973.

Map evidence shows that the living room extension that replaced the conservatory was constructed at some point between 1918 and 1946. The house appears to have been renovated in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with further alterations carried out in the late 1970s.

References: Primary Sources
1 PRONI VAL/12/B/16/8A-D Valuation revision books, 1899-1930
2 PRONI OS/6/3/27/3 OS Map, Co. Down sheet 27, 1903
3 PRONI VAL/12/A/3/13 Valuer’s office notebook, 1908
4 PRONI OS/6/3/27/4 OS Map, Co. Down sheet 27, 1918
5 1911 census (available online at http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie )
6 ‘Belfast News-Letter’, 19 October 1917
7 PRONI VAL/12/F/4/1/1 Valuation revision book (1930-35)
8 ‘Belfast News-Letter’, 22 February 1933
9 PRONI VAL/3/C/4/4 First General Revaluation (1936-57)
10 ‘Belfast News-Letter’, 4 May 1937
11 ‘Belfast News-Letter’, 5 November 1937
13 PRONI VAL/3/D/4/2/B/10 First General Revaluation (1933-57)
15 OS map, Co. Down sheet 27, 1946
16 ‘Belfast News-Letter’, 14 June 1946
17 OS map sheet 220-8SE, 1969

Secondary Sources
1 Smith, Philip, ‘Buildings of South County Down’, (UAHS, Belfast, 2019), p.211
2 Information from owner, 2019

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
G. Innovatory Qualities
H-. Alterations detracting from building
H+. Alterations enhancing the building
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

S. Authenticity
X. Local Interest
R. Age

Evaluation

'Glencar' is a two-storey four-bay detached house situated on the Newry Road, Banbridge, built in 1908 in an interpretation of the then sought-after Domestic-Revival style.

The name 'Glencar' may have originated from Glencar waterfall , which would have been well know to the Allinghams who built the house and were from County Leitrim.

Architectural ornamentation and detailing are largely intact or have been sensitively restored, clearly conveying the building's levels of integrity. Of interest is the early use of 'cavity walling' noted in the contemporary valuations, in the construction of the house, built 'regardless of expense'.

Modifications have contributed to the building's significance: the replacement of the metal windows with timber replicas is in keeping with the Arts and Crafts idiom; the conversion of the glass house, in the first part of the 20thC, was also carried out in the Arts and Crafts style as though to create an 'inglenook' off the sitting room. The original proportions, typical of the style, are largely unchanged. The survival of the plan form is significant; despite some alterations it is possible to appreciate the original design intent.

Despite the replacement of some windows in uPVC, the house is a good example of the type, with the original setting around the house surviving and contributing to its special interest. The house in its setting is of local interest surviving as a representative of the ongoing expansion of Banbridge from the later Nineteenth century into the Twentieth.