Woburn Cottage

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Woburn Cottage is a fussy picturesque former school house (now a single storey dwelling house), which has been restored and sympathetically extended recently. It is situated on the S side of the Woburn Road, c.2 miles S of Millisle. The building is constructed in basalt rubble with sandstone dressings and has gables with elaborate barges.

The projecting entrance porch is located in the centre of the E facade. It has a gabled roof with Bangor blue slates and an overhang with decorative barges and a finial. The doorway (on the E facade) has a four centred arch head, painted sandstone dressings (as do all original openings) and a timber sheeted door. Above the doorway, to the gable apex, is a carved head, now painted.

To the N and S facades of the porch is a very narrow window with painted sandstone dressings. The porch has a ‘stepped’ chamfered plinth (as does the whole of the original building) and stone steps to the doorway.

The longer N facade has a gable at either end each with barges, carved head etc. as porch. Below the carved head on each gable is a sandstone slit recess with semicircular arched headed dressing. Below this is a timber casement window with painted "Gibbs surround" sandstone dressings with carved cross motif in circle on ‘lintel’. Between the end gables are two windows, much as gables only larger and without cross motif. The window to the left was made into a doorway at some point (c.1960s), but has recently been restored. In the centre of the roof between the end gables is a small (recently rebuilt/restored) gabled dormer, with shaped barges and casement window much as previous but with smooth render window surround. The dormer walls are finished in rough cast render and painted dark grey in order to blend in with original basalt facade.

The W facade is blank but has a central chimney breast (with unpainted sandstone quoins), which rises above eaves, tapering in ‘stepped’ fashion to a tall decorative chimney pot.

The rear facade has end gables, much as front but with a small upper level casement window. Between the two rear end gables a recent, but sympathetic gabled return has been constructed, which links to a new matching gabled section to the S (running parallel with the original building giving the whole structure an overall roughly ‘H’ shaped plan form).

The roof of the original section is gabled, steeply pitched and covered in Bangor blue slates. Large overhang at verge and eaves. Cast iron rw goods.

Cast iron pump to NW of building.

Historical information

This former school house was built in the latter half of the nineteenth century by George Dunbar of near by Woburn House. Susan Pack-Beresford in her recent history of Carrowdore Parish, states that the building dates from c.1855, a date supported by the fact that a building marked school house is shown on this site on the revised OS Map of 1858-60. However, the overall elaborate picturesque style suggests that the building could well be 1860s or 70s (replacing an even earlier structure), though one assumes that it was completed before George Dunbar’s death in 1875. Woburn School closed in 1927 and at some point after this the building was converted to a dwelling house. Extensive restoration work was carried out in 1996/7 and a large extension added at the rear.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps 1st Revision 1858-60, Down 7.

Secondary sources
1 Susan E. Pack Beresford 'Christ Church Carrowdore' (1994), pp. 17-18, 61-62.
2 Grace Seymour 'Echoes of Millisle and District' (Rathfriland ?c.1980), p.146 [Grace Seymour states that the Dunbar-Bullers built Woburn School. If this is so (and she offers no concrete evidence in support) it would date the building to 1884 (the year Georgiana Dunbar-Buller inherited the Woburn estate), or even later.]

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
H+. Alterations enhancing the building
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Picturesque one and a half storey school house of c.1860 which has been recently sympathetically renovated and restored and converted into a dwelling house. The original exterior walls are built of rubble basalt with sandstone dressings and the roof is slated. To the rear there is a large recent extension which is constructed in much the same style as the original building and which successfully increases the floor area without detracting from the character.