Rosevale House

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Two storey house with later return and recent extension to rear.

Front E facade has central timber and glazed front door with semi circular fanlight (with acid etched glass to door and fanlight), all encased with fluted pilasters, shaped brackets and cornice. Window to left of door with horizontal and vertical astragals, made to resemble sliding sash and case but with top hung upper opener. Window to right of door as before, with three similar (but slightly smaller) evenly spaced to first floor. Simple moulded surrounds to windows. Front has chamfered quoins and plinth.

N facade consists of side of original house with a side of a large (flush) two storey flat roofed extension. The original house has a window similar to front but smaller (and with smaller upper opener) to left on ground floor with similar window (but with much larger upper opener) to right on first floor, whilst extension has window in centre of ground floor (as ground floor on main house N side) with window to first floor similar to front. Original 1971 survey suggests there was decorated door to N side main house, this has since been blocked up.

S facade consists on side of original house which has at some point had a short return added. There is a small window with horizontal and vertical astragals to the left on the ground floor with a larger fixed light window to the right. To the first floor there is a window, similar to first floor front, to the left, with a large opening with PVC double ‘balcony’ doors (but as yet without a balcony).

W rear facade consists of rear of flat roofed extension and rear of short return which merge into one another, with a central timber and glazed back door with a large multi pane window to either side. The first floor has three windows as first floor front.

Entire facade finished in rough cast render and (mainly) painted. Roof of original house and return hipped with Bangor blue slates and two yellow brick chimneys. There is a small concrete brick chimney to the flat roofed extension. PVC gutters and down spouts.

Adjacent out houses appear older than house itself.

Historical information

Smaller building shown on this site on 1834 and 1860 OS maps, but none matches exactly the positioning of Rosevale House. The owner of the nearby Ballygraffan House informed the writers that Rosevale was built at the same time as his own home (c.1865) and was also based on a farmhouse elsewhere in Ireland. Again, like Ballygraffan House, this building has a somewhat late Georgian feel suggesting it may have been based on an earlier house. The return appears to have been added some time in the mid twentieth century and the extension (according to local knowledge) built c.1990. Evidence suggests the adjacent out houses are early nineteenth century.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps, 1st Edition, 1834, Co. Down 18.
2 PRONI VAL 1B/312 1st valuation, St. Andrews, c.1835.
3 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps, 1st Revision, 1860, Co. Down 18.
4 PRONI 2nd valuation, St. Andrews, c.1863.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Formal, two storey, hipped roof farm house of c.1865 with slight Georgian overtones. The rear has been greatly extended in recent times.