40 SUNNYSIDE ST.

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Two-storey red-brick terrace house, built in 1904 and located on Sunnyside Street - a canted busy thoroughfare connecting the Ormeau Road with Annadale Embankment, approx. 3 km from Belfast city centre. The main part of the house is rectangular on plan with a rectangular two-storey mono-pitched return. One of a row of 21 no. Terraced houses set on the South side of Sunnyside Street, the area is residential with mainly small terraced houses built at the end of the nineteenth century and some semi-detached houses dating from the beginning of the twentieth century.

Materials:

Roof : Natural slate
Walls: Smooth red clay brick
Windows: Painted timber 2/2 sliding-sash single-glazed to the front and painted timber top-hung to the rear.
RWG: Cast iron to front and uPVC to rear.

Front elevation (N)
The front elevation has a painted timber 4 panel door to the left with a 2/2 painted timber sliding sash window to the right. The door has a semi-circular head with a moulded architrave and the window has a segmental head also with a moulded architrave. A similar but smaller window is almost centrally positioned on the first floor. Brickwork is laid in English Garden Wall bond with clay ventilation bricks at each level and a blue-brick course and projecting moulded brick course at eaves level, supporting cast metal ogee guttering. Natural slate roof with red-brick chimney stack on the right-hand side with projecting brick course and clay pots.

Rear elevation (S)
The rear elevation of the main house has 2 top-hung painted timber windows – one above the other. There is a 2-storey mono- pitched return, constructed in 1988, built with rustic red clay brick with top hung windows and thin concrete sills. The rear wall of the extension has a single window at first floor level similar to those in the yard elevation. There is a narrow rectangular paved yard. Beyond the internal yard and accessed from it through a painted boarded door is a good sized garden set in grass. This is separated from a communal lane to the rear by a waist level concrete block wall. It is likely that originally there would have been a 2.5 m red brick wall here.

Side elevation (E) abuts No 38 Sunnyside Street - HB26.01.009M

Side elevation (W) abuts No 42 Sunnyside Street - HB26.01.009O

There is a small front garden finished in concrete block paviors, set behind a replacement red-brick boundary wall and gateway with painted metal railings and small painted metal arched gate. This boundary treatment was installed along with the new front doors and windows c1988 as part of an improvement scheme encompassing the whole terrace. The rear of the terrace is bounded to south by communal laneway shared with Whitehall Gdns.

Historical information

Sunnyside Street is shown for the first time on the OS town plan of 1871-73 as a lane stretching from the Ormeau Road to the current junction with Whitehall Parade, the sole development along it a terrace of six houses on the north side marked as ‘Sunnyside’ (present nos.43-53). On Marcus Ward’s 1879 map of Belfast it is designated ‘Sunnyside Street’ (undoubtedly taking its name from the original terrace) and is shown extending slightly further west, just beyond the intersection of the present Rushfield Avenue, but no new developments are marked on this or on the OS town plans of 1883-84 and 1896. On the 1901-03 plan the present nos.14-24 are shown, with greater development on northern side also, and the street itself extended as far as the junction with Walmer Street, with brick fields between this and the River Lagan. The opening of King’s Bridge in 1912 allowed the street to reach its current extent, making it a thoroughfare linking directly through to Ridgeway Street on the other side of the River Lagan.
No.40 This house is part of a long terrace of twenty one dwellings which although virtually identical are of slightly different dates. Nos.14-24 are shown on the OS map of 1903, and recorded in valuation book during that year, with nos.26-42 entered into the same book the following year, and nos.44-52 first noted in the succeeding book during 1910. The developer of nos.14-42 appears to have been Hugh Scott, who is listed as the lessor for all of these particular properties in 1906, but the identity of the architect (if any) is not known.
The first occupant of No.40 appears to have been Hugh Rea, noted in the street directories as a baker. The 1911 census records the building as a second-class dwelling containing five rooms, with Mr. Rea occupying the property with his Rachel, Jane, their two children and his wife’s widowed mother, Mary Fraser. The Rea family were still living there up until at least 1935, with Miss A.M. Thompson noted as the occupant in 1943, the Rea family back again in 1945, and Miss Thompson returning by 1951. In 1967, R. Hobson, a ‘Corporation official’, is noted as the occupant, a Cowan Dorman in 1980 and Joan M. Broder in 1990. Ms Broder was still in residence in 1995, but the property has changed hands on at least one occasion since then.
The property was listed in 1986. The rear extension was added c.1988.

References – Primary sources
1 PRONI OS8/30/2/OS town plan of Belfast, 1871-73,
2 Marcus Ward’s ‘Shilling Map of Belfast’, 1879
3 PRONI OS8/30/3/59 1883-84
4 PRONI OS8/30/4/59 1896
5 PRONI VAL12B/43A/34, annual valuation revision book, 1897-1905
6 Census of Ireland, 1901, 1911 [online]
7 PRONI OS8/30/5/59 1903
8 ‘Belfast and Province of Ulster Street Directory’, (Belfast News-Letter, Belfast), various dates from 1903 to 95
9 PRONI VAL12B/43K/4, valuation book, 1906-15
10 HED File relating to HB26.01.009N (c.1986- )

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
H-. Alterations detracting from building
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
Z. Rarity
T. Historic Importance
S. Authenticity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

2-storey, red-brick terrace house built 1904. Part of a larger terrace of 21 no. similar houses (HB26/01/009A-U), located on the South side of Sunnyside Street approx. 3 km from Belfast city centre. The house retains its external character, including panelled timber front door, sliding-sash windows, stucco surrounds and slate roof. Despite an extension to the rear and remodelling of the original interior and front boundary, the building has significant group value with the rest of the terrace. A good example of modest Edwardian urban terraced housing, built at a time when Belfast was expanding rapidly from the city centre southwards along the main thoroughfares of the Ormeau, Lisburn and Malone Roads.

General comments

No. 40 Listed separately 125th List, List No. 860