100 Malone Road ('Montpellier')

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Large late Georgian style residence of c.1840 with stucco façade, a Corinthian columned portico (added c.1875), and large 1½ storey rear return. The property is believed to be the earliest of the suburban residences to have been built along what is now Malone Road. This followed the opening up of Malone ridge to development in the mid 19th century. It stands, on the east side of the Malone Road with its back to the road itself, its formerly extensive grounds to the north developed in the mid 1870s with the building of two further residences, (the present nos.92 and 94), with another large 1870s house, no.96, sited just to the west. Sandwiched between the property and no.96 is another building, no.98 which dates mainly from 1912 when a storey was added to some outbuildings, but which was divided internally to form two properties in 1968. To the south there is a large area of waste ground, which was the site of a large villa built in 1878 but demolished in the mid 1990s; only a former outbuilding -now converted to a flat- remains (to the immediate south of no.98)

No.100 is approached by a driveway to the NW side which also allows access to nos.96 and 98.

The front (E) elevation is symmetrical. To the centre of the ground floor is the main entrance. This consists of a timber panelled door (reached via three stone steps) with a large elliptical arched fanlight and sidelights. The fanlight has spider-web tracery with curving ‘interlaced’ tracery to the sidelights, panelled aprons and panelled pilaster jambs. The entrance is surrounded by a portico (added c.1875- it shares similarities with the porticoes of the neighbouring properties of this date) with Corinthian columns with respondent pilasters set on conjoined base supporting an entablature with cornice and a ‘flat’ roof with glazing.

To the left of the entrance are two Georgian-paned sash windows (6/6) with simple moulded surrounds and linking cills. To the right of the entrance is an identical arrangement with five more similar windows to the first floor. The front façade is finished in painted lined render with in-out quoins. The other elevations are similarly finished.

The S gable has a window to the centre of the ground floor, as front but without surround. To the centre of the first floor is a similar window, with a small plain sash window to right at attic level. To the left on the N gable are two windows, as ground floor S gable, though with that to right slightly shorter. There is a small window to left at attic level, as that on S gable.

The rear elevation is difficult to observe has it is dominated by a large 1½ storey return, which appears to have been extended in the early 1900s, an which to the W directly abuts the neighbouring property of no.98, and which to S spans over what appears to have been a formerly open yard, abutting a recent-looking summer house further to S. Only the N (single storey) face of the return is clearly exposed, this face having a timber sheeted door, a large multi leaded-light window to left and a very narrow leaded-light window to right. The N side of the return roof has a (typically Edwardian) curved ‘eyebrow’ dormer, with Velux windows close to the ridge. The lower portion S side of the roof (which spans over the former yard) is largely glazed.

To the rear façade of the main house there is a sash window to left on the first floor, as ground floor S gable, but with decorative railings over. Internal evidence suggests there is a similar window to right, but this could not be seen from the outside. To the centre of the façade, is a small sash window (3/3) set at upper half-landing level.

The main gabled roof is slated with [?stone] parapets and three Velux windows to front (which were put in place of some Edwardian dormers). Two tall rendered chimneystacks (to each gable), with cornice courses and recent looking plain pots. To the rear there is a smaller rendered stack.

The small summer house to S appears to be a recent addition. It is single storey, rendered, with a slated hipped roof topped with a small glazed cone-shaped ‘dome’. To (E) front is a central glazed double door with glazed ‘fanlight’ gable above and large flanking multi-paned windows. To SE of the summer house there was once a glass house, but this was demolished [?c.1980s]. Abutting the right hand side of the N gable there is a recently added gate screen with sympathetic square gate piers with cornice caps and ball finials, and simple wrought iron gates. To front (E-SE) of the house there is a large garden.

Historical information

After 1823, leases ‘in perpetuity’ began to be granted by the Donegall estate in relation to land to the south of Belfast. In the long term this eventually lead to the development of what is now the University, Lisburn Road and Malone areas, however, in the decades immediately following 1823 it lead to the acquisition of parcels of land by the Belfast professional and mercantile classes and the erection of various ‘country’ residences / villas along the Malone Ridge, where once there had stood a few humble farm houses. ‘Montpellier’* was one such residence (claimed by the present owner to be the earliest), erected by Thomas Gilmore -a tea, wine and spirit merchant with premises in High Street- on 14 acres of land he acquired in 1836.

The actual date of construction is uncertain, the house is shown on the OS map of 1858 and Paul Larmour (secondary source no.2) says 1852-54, however, the current resident, (who is quite knowledgeable as to the history of the property), knows of no evidence to support this- neither has any been uncovered by this writer. It is perhaps more likely, given its late Georgian look and the fact that Gilmore came into possession of the land in 1836, that the house was built at least a decade prior to 1852. Moreover, the slightly ‘Tudoresque’ fireplaces in some of the bedrooms match those found in Wilmont Terrace, which was built near the north end of the Lisburn Road in 1840, and the valuation of 1860 grades the building ‘A+/B+’ suggesting that at that point it was closer to twenty years old rather than eight. As well as the house itself, Gilmore also built a small single storey gate lodge (‘Montpellier Cottage’) to front the drive which originally curved in an east-south-easterly direction from what is now the Malone Road, and, to the south of the house, a garden was laid out.

Thomas Gilmore died in 1870 and the house and its land were acquired by Samuel Gibson, a Belfast ‘druggist and grocer’. By this stage the ‘suburbanisation’ of the Lisburn Road / University area was well advanced as the town’s business classes began to push further south into the Malone. Thus it became lucrative to subdivide plots such as Montpellier, and in 1875-76 Gibson erected two new large houses, (Carlton House’), just to the north of the original building, another to the west, and, in 1877-78, a large villa to the south, where he himself was to reside. The small gate lodge, the original drive and the garden were all cleared away in the process, and, as well as this, changes were made to the original house itself, with an Ionic portico added and outbuildings built between it and the new house to the west. The building may have been rendered at this time also (to match the portico) for the 1860 valuation states that it was in brick at that stage.

After 1878, when Samuel Gibson had moved into his newly built villa to the south of the original house, the latter property went through a number of tenants including a stockbroker named John McKee, followed by a John Glover and then in the late 1890s and early 1900s by Samuel Dill MD the then Professor of Greek at Queens. In 1912 a storey was added to the outbuildings to the rear of the house, creating a new property –aptly named ‘The nook’.

The original ‘Montpellier’ remained in the ownership of the Gibson family until 1951, when it and ‘The Nook’ were sold to the present owner’s father. Since that time, there have been some changes to the rear return of the original house with The Nook divided into two properties (c.1968). The large villa to the south was demolished in the mid 1990s.

[*The name ‘Montpellier’ may relate to the French connections [?trading links] of the Rev. George Macartney-Black, from whom Thomas Gilmore bought the land in 1836.]

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI OS/6/1/61/1 OS map [6in], Co Antrim sh 61, 1832
2 ‘Martin’s Belfast directory’ (Belfast 1839, 40-41, 1841-42)
3 ‘Henderson’s Belfast directory’ (Belfast, occasional issues in the period 1843-52)
4 ‘Belfast and Province of Ulster directory’ (Belfast 1852, 1854, 1856, 1858, 1860- )
5 PRONI OS/6/1/61/2 OS map [6in], Co Antrim sh 61, 1858
6 PRONI VAL/2B/1/2a Second valuation, Shankill parish, 1860
7 PRONI VAL/12B/5/6a Annual (valuation) revision book, 1864-65
8 PRONI VAL/12B/5/6b Annual (valuation) revision book, 1866-79
9 PRONI VAL/12B/5/6c Annual (valuation) revision book, 1879-85
10 PRONI VAL/12B/5/6d Annual (valuation) revision book, 1885-93
11 PRONI VAL/12B/5/63 Annual (valuation) revision book, 1894-97
12 PRONI VAL/12E/192c/57/3 Valuation town plan of Belfast, sh 57, 1894-95

Secondary sources
1 S.T. Carleton, ‘The growth of South Belfast’ (MA thesis, QUB, 1967)
2 Paul Larmour, ‘The architectural heritage of Malone and Stranmillis’ (Belfast 1994), p.
3 Information supplied by the present owner (2001).

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Large, relatively plain late Georgian style residence of c.1840 with stucco façade, Corinthian columned portico (added c.1875), and a large 1½ storey rear return, located at the end of a short laneway which leads off to the south from the Malone Road. The property is believed to be the earliest of the suburban residences / villas to have been built along what is now Malone Road, following the opening up of Malone ridge to development in the mid 19th century. The property appears to have been originally in brick, the stucco probably dating from the 1870s.