23 Island Kelly Park

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Pair of semi-detached rendered former local authority houses, built c.1925. Square on plan facing west and located on the east side of Island Kelly Park within its own grounds, now abandoned and vandalised.

Hipped natural slate roof with black clay ridge tiles and a central redbrick chimneystack with moulded cement coping and black clay pots. Cast-iron guttering on iron brackets to timber eaves and cast-iron downpipes. Rough-cast cement render over redbrick walling. Square-headed window openings with concrete sills and original 8/8 timber sash windows.

Front two-bay elevation has a pair of windows to each floor.

North side elevation has a single window opening to the first floor with a projecting redbrick windbreaker entrance porch having moulded concrete hood and original sheeted and glazed timber door.

Rear elevation is abutted by a pair of flat-roofed single-bay two-storey returns with timber casement windows and a further pair of timber sash windows to the first floor.

South side elevation as per north elevation.

Setting:
Located on the east side of Island Kelly Park in a suburban
setting within its own site having a semi-detached flat-roofed redbrick services block to the rear yard.

Roof Natural slate
RWG Cast-iron
Walling Rough-cast render over redbrick
Windows Timber sash(glass missing/broken)

Historical information

The pair of semi-detatched houses do not appear on the Ordnance Survey map until the fifth edition in 1920-1931. This map depicts the building as one of three square-shaped structures constructed north of Lisburn in Island Kelly Park during this period.

The construction of public housing for small labourers and farmers throughout Ireland was made possible with the Labourer’s Acts, first passed in 1883, which allowed local authorities, such as the Lisburn Rural District Council, to construct over 50,000 new cottages for landless labourers, with the aid of financial assistance from the state. The majority of these cottages were simple, functional dwellings which were constructed in the outskirts of major urban areas and villages. In the province of Ulster just under 10,000 such cottages were built or improved between the years 1891 and 1911, although construction of their type continued for some time after Partition (Aalen, pp 161-163). This semi-detached Local Authority House is exemplary of this type of labourers cottage although it is currently abandoned and has fallen into a state of disrepair; many of the windows have been broken whilst the yard has become a dumping ground for waste.

References

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/1/64/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey map 1832-33
2. PRONI OS/6/1/64/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey map 1858
3. PRONI OS/6/1/64/3 – Third Edition Ordnance Survey map 1901
4. PRONI OS/6/1/64/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey map 1920-1921
5. PRONI OS/6/1/64/5 – Fifth Edition Ordnance Survey map 1920-1931

Secondary Sources

1. Aalen, F. H. A.; Whelan, K.; Stout, M., ‘Atlas of the Irish Rural Landscape’ Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Pair of semi-detached rendered former local authority houses, built c.1925. Retaining their early twentieth-century appearance with some external fabric intact, the pair of houses represent an increasingly rare example of their type. Now abandoned the building has been subject to vandalism resulting in loss of its glazing. Although of interest the damage to the building fabric has resulted in loss of historic character and it does not meet the criteria for listing.

General comments

This record was completed without access to original source material held by the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland.