17 UNIVERSITY SQUARE

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Three storey with attic, two bay, red brick, mid terraced former townhouse, now used as university offices for the School of History, Anthropology and Politics at Queen’s University. The terrace was built in stages between 1848-1853 with No 17 constructed in 1852. While University Square was laid out by Charles Lanyon, the architect of the actual terrace is unconfirmed. Fronting onto University Square in South Belfast, which links University Road on the west and Botanic Avenue on the east, the terrace faces south and overlooks the Old Library (now QUB Student Graduate Centre – HB26/27/002) and the grounds of the northern end of The Lanyon Building (HB26/27/005). No 17 is located approximately mid way along the row of 30 former houses and is flanked by No 16 (HB26/27/021P) on the west and No 18 (HB26/27/021R) on the east. No 17 is abutted at the rear by a three storey return built at half landing level, in turn abutted by a three storey mews building.

Materials:
Roof: Natural Welsh slate (replacement)
Walls: Red brick in Flemish bond
Windows: Front (S) - Timber sliding sash, single-glazed, horns to GF & FF (all appear original)
Rear (N), return & mews building - timber sliding sash, single-glazed / metal top hung / leaded
Dormer window to rear – timber casement
RWGs: Hidden parapet gutter to roof, painted metal (S) / Painted metal to yard & rear of mews building (N) / plastic soil vent pipe to yard (N)

Front Elevation (S):
Three storey with attic, two bay, mid terraced, red brick flat facade built in Flemish bond with the entrance on left side of ground floor. Two single window openings to right side of door on ground floor level, and two above on both first and second floor levels (FF & SF aligned with each other but not with GF) beneath plain rendered plinth and corbelled painted stone cornice with lead to parapet edges.
Pitched natural Welsh slate roof with red clay ridge tiles, brick chimneys with corbel detailing (rebuilt) to both left and right, shared with neighbours, with seven yellow clay pots each. Flat roof dormer window to RHS of roof with lead cheeks and roof, timber casement windows.
On ground floor level the doorway has an elliptical arched head with brick voussoirs and moulded plaster reveal, deeply recessed with fluted columns with Doric-type capitals to each side. The columns support a plain painted rendered entablature with moulded cornice. Original spoked fanlight (likely painted timber) with plain glass panes. Painted timber door (likely to be a c1915-1920 replacement) with three tall rectangular panels to bottom section, central oval panel and a nine-pane top section with arched head and bullseye glazing to six of the panes. Replacement ironmongery.
All windows to front are timber sliding sash, single glazed, have painted rendered reveals and splayed brick heads and appear to be original; two single window openings to ground floor, both 6/6, separate painted stone cills; two 6/6 windows to FF over continuous painted stone cill course; two 6/6 windows to SF (historic glass apparent) with separate painted stone cills.
Hidden parapet gutter to roof, likely to be formed in lead. Painted metal downpipe with metal hopper to RHS.

Four replacement reconstituted stone steps from street level leading to landing of reconstituted stone paving slabs. Modern metal railings either side of steps. Small garden to front with shrubs. Flemish bond low brick boundary wall to street (not original) with reconstituted stone coping beneath replacement painted metal railings.

Side elevation (W):
Fully abutted by No 16 (HB26/27/021P) on the west side.

Side elevation (E):
Fully abutted by No 18 (HB26/27/021R) on the east side.

Rear Elevation (N):
Main rear elevation is painted render and three storeys high with attic. It is abutted on right side by a three storey return, which is further abutted by a three storey mews building to north. A yard (shared with No 18) is enclosed by the main rear elevation, the E side wall of the rear return, the south wall of the mews building (and single storey flat roofed infill extension) and the side wall of the rear return to No 18. Rainwater goods are painted metal, guttering supported on metal rise & fall brackets. Soil vent pipe is plastic.
All walls to rear are painted render, with painted rendered plinth. All windows to the rear have plain reveals and appear to have painted stone cills (unless otherwise stated).
All windows to rear are timber sliding sash, some appear original and others may be replacement. The exposed section of the main elevation on left side has a window opening on each level; bay window to GF with lead flat roof, metal windows with small square top panes and tall panes to bottom section, painted timber cill. All top panes have leaded coloured obscure glazing, windows to canted sides are multi-pane leaded with obscure glass, plain glass to three tall panes to central section. 6/6 windows to both FF and SF. Flat roof dormer window to LHS of rear roof slope; lead cheeks and roof, triple timber casement window (modern).
Side wall (E) of rear return has a centrally located 8/8 window to ground floor level. First floor has three windows, all 1/1, regularly spaced. Second floor level has 4 window openings; a double patterned leaded casement window with obscure glass panes to extreme left side, then three 6/6 windows to right.
North wall of rear yard (S wall of mews building) is abutted by the single storey extension on ground floor which has a modern flush door to left side and a 3/6 window to right at ground floor level. First floor level is blank, 6/6 window to second floor.
The E elevation of the mews building is abutted by the single storey extension on ground floor and is blank above.
The W elevation of the rear return faces onto the yard with No 16; ground floor has a patterned leaded fixed pane window to right side and a modern flush door on left; 8/8 timber sliding sash window to right side of first floor and small sliding sash window to left side; patterned leaded window with obscure glass to right side of second floor level. Painted rendered chimney to left side, rising above roof of mews building to No 16.
Rear elevation of mews building onto alley way has paired 3/6 windows to single storey extension on left side; a 3/6 window on left side of ground floor, flush timber door to centre and another 3/6 window on right side; three window openings to first floor – a 6/6 to left and centre and a 3/6 on right; single window opening on second floor level with a 6/6 window. All windows to rear appear to be replacements. All ground floor windows have metal grilles added, attached to reveals. Roof to return and mews building is hipped natural slate with red clay ridge tiles.
Further modern buildings to rear of mews building onto University Square Mews.

Historical information

As its name suggests, University Square was one of a number of streets created as a direct consequence of the construction of Queen’s College in 1845-49. Set immediately north of the College’s grounds, the street (originally intended to be named ‘Victoria Square’) was laid out in c.1847 under the direction of the designer of the college itself, Charles Lanyon, on land set aside for development by then owner, Jane Gregg. The rear (northern) ends of the house plots followed an already established boundary of a garden belonging to a pre-1832 residence whose integrity had begun to be broken up by the building of present nos.2-6 Mount Charles in 1842, nos.42-48 University Road in 1846-48, and, around the same time, the creation of what was to become University Street.

The new thoroughfare was mainly populated by large, generally similar but not entirely uniform, three-storey late-Georgian style brick-built terraced dwellings, nos.18-25 dating from 1848-49, 26-27 built in 1849-51, 4-17 in 1852, 28-30 in 1852-53, with the High Victorian nos.1-3 (on the site of three pre-1837 dwellings) following in 1871. Although Lanyon determined the layout, there is no indication that he was actually involved in the design of the houses themselves. Building agreements dating from 1847 state that the frontages were to be based Glenfield Place, a terrace then being built on Ormeau Road (present nos.121-35 - HB26/27/007A-H). The architect behind the latter is not known, but Paul Larmour has suggested that the University Square properties derived from it were the work of the prolific Belfast-based architect Thomas Jackson. So far no documentary evidence has surfaced to confirm this, but both the style of the buildings, and the fact that Jackson was later to be responsible for nos.1-3, suggests he may well have been involved with whole terrace. That said, many of the interiors have odd layout quirks (for example most of the entrances are awkwardly off-centre when viewed from their respective hallways), which seems uncharacteristic of Jackson.

The broad unity of nos.4-30 was broken in 1865 when the single-storey canted bay was added to no.19, with a two-storey version built on no.23 before 1873, similar projections appearing on nos.20 and 22 by 1883, and several others following suit in the early 1900s - some canted (nos.7 and 11) and some rounded (nos.12, 14 and 30); most of the dormers appear to be of the early 1900s also, as does the pebbledash to no.20. The mid to later 20th century witnessed changes to the rears of many of the properties, with extensions of various sizes added to many, in particular Queen’s Film Theatre at the rear of no.20, which started out in 1968 in a lecture hall addition but which, following several rebuilds (the most recent and most extensive in c.2004), has spread into what were the formerly the back gardens of a significant number of its neighbours to either side. The whole terrace underwent a major renovation in c.1990-94, with the small front gardens landscaped and adapted for disabled access c.2004.

The street was populated in its early years by a mixture of Queen’s academics, and those well-off Belfast merchants and professionals wishing to escape the confines of the rapidly commercialising town centre for more sedate surrounds. By c.1920 the terrace was largely occupied by medical men and their families, but with the opening up of ‘education for all’ in the late 1940s, the properties were gradually acquired by Queen’s for use by their growing range of departments. By 1960 the University had taken possession of around two-thirds of the buildings, was occupying all bar one by 1974, with all coming into QUB use by the mid-1980s.

To the rear of the terrace two mews houses are noted from c.1880 onwards, one of which remained occupied as a private dwelling up until the 1960s. Both have since demolished to make way for QUB extensions.

No.17 was one of the ‘fourteen new houses building’ noted in the 1852 Belfast street directory. Samuel Thompson (a ‘merchant’ with offices in Corporation Street) is noted as the occupant in the 1858-59 street directory and in the c.1861 valuation, with William Linden the immediate lessor and the property valued at £47 for rateable purposes. The next resident was Adam T. Macauley, ‘director of the Belfast Bank’, c.1877-c.82, followed (after a period of vacancy) by William McKean (‘manager of William Ewart & Sons’ and later ‘partner in the Co. Down Weaving Co.’), c.1886-c.1900, and William Russell (‘salesman’ and later ‘director of A. & S. Henry & Co. Ltd.’). In the 1901 census Mr. McKean is recorded as living there with his wife, Lydia Anne, their grown-up son, a cousin and two domestic servants, with the house itself is recorded as a ‘first class’ dwelling with 16 rooms in use. H.L. McKissack, a physician, occupied no.17 from c.1905 to c.1909, and was succeeded c.1910 by Mrs. Marion Andrews, who in the census of the next year was living there with her two grown-up children and two domestic servants. The Andrews were followed by Dr. P.E. Loy, c.1922-26, then S.R. Foster. In c.1953 the property was acquired by Queen’s for use as the University’s Departments of Archaeology and Applied Mathematics, with Archaeology the sole occupant from the later 1950s until c.1993 when the building became part of the faculty of Law

The building was listed in 1979. The early to mid 1990s refurbishment of the whole terrace witnessed the renewal of no.17’s roof coverings, chimney and rainwater goods, render to the rear / return and replacement of some return window frames, with the internal walls re-plastered and some woodwork replaced. In c.2003-04 the front garden adapted for disabled access around the same date.

References – Primary sources
1 ‘Northern Whig’, 17 March 1849
2 ‘Belfast and Province of Ulster Street Directory’, (Belfast News-Letter, Belfast), various dates from 1852 to 1996
3 PRONI VAL12B/43A/4 annual valuation revision book, c.1861-81
4 PRONI VAL12B/43A/14 annual valuation revision book, 1882-97
5 PRONI OS8/30/3/49 OS town plan of Belfast, 1883-84
6 PRONI OS8/30/4/49 OS town plan of Belfast, 1896
8 PRONI VAL12B/43A/36 annual valuation revision book, 1897-1905
7 Census of Ireland, 1901, 1911 [online - http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/]
8 PRONI OS8/30/5/49 OS town plan of Belfast, 1903
9 PRONI VAL12B/43P/3 valuation book, 1906-15
13 PRONI VAL12B/43P/6 valuation book, 1916-30
14 OS maps, 1958, 1970 (online - http://www.centremapslive.co.uk/)

Secondary sources
1 Carleton, S.T., ‘The growth of South Belfast’, (unpublished QUB MA thesis), 1967
2 Rowan, A.J. and Brett, C.E.B., Historic Buildings…Queens University of Belfast, (Belfast, UAHS, revised ed. 1980)
3 David Evans and Paul Larmour, ‘Queen’s an Architectural legacy’, (Belfast, 1995), pp.51-53

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
H-. Alterations detracting from building
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Three storey with attic, red brick, mid terraced, early Victorian former townhouse, The terrace was built in stages between 1848-1853 with No 17 constructed in 1852. While University Square was laid out by Charles Lanyon, the architect of the actual terrace is unconfirmed. The terrace faces south onto University Square in South Belfast and overlooks the Old Library (now QUB Student Graduate Centre – HB26/27/002) and the grounds of the northern end of The Lanyon Building (HB26/27/005). No 17 is located approximately mid way along the row of 30 former houses and is flanked by No 16 (HB26/27/021P) on the west and No 18 (HB26/27/021R) on the east. No 17 is now used as offices for the School of History, Anthropology and Politics at Queen’s University with most of the rooms now serving as offices and meeting rooms. Internally there have been changes to the original floor plan, however some original features survive. The exterior retains much original character, proportions and detailing to the front with its distinctive doorcase with an elliptical arched head beneath brick voussoirs and fluted columns with Doric-type capitals, a detail which is repeated throughout the terraced row. There is coherence to the terrace despite elevational variations such as bay and bow windows which were added to some of the houses during the late 1800s into the early 1900s. No 17 is distinguished from the rest by having 6/6 timber sliding sash windows on all levels of the front facade and an original spoked fanlight above the door. The terrace has strong value as a group (Nos 4-30 University Square - HB26/27/015D-DD) and adds significant character to its setting within the Queen’s Conservation Area.