Larger Bandstand

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Dating from 1925, the bandstand is situated to the southeast of the Colenso Parade entrance to Botanic Gardens. Square in plan with painted brick base, ten square columns – four number equally spaced to the North and South elevations and two equidistant to the west and open to the east - supporting hipped roof with central gablet to each side. Open on all sides with metal railings to east, south and west sides, railings and steps to north, principal elevation. Painted brick plinth with overhang, five steps to raised floor. Two square columns, one at each end, with chamfered corners, rendered finish, painted white concealing steel RSJs, exposed at soffit. Slim steel railings, approximately 1m in height fixed between columns. Decorative timber fascia with upright and cross design, below painted down stand. Hipped roof with natural slates, terracotta ridge tiles, small gable with vertical boarding to apex, timber bargeboards and soffit, uPVC rainwater goods (downpipes). Painted sheeted timber ceiling with central square design.

Materials: Roof : slate - RWG: cast iron and uPVC – structural support : concrete clad metal posts

Setting: The bandstand is located to the southeast of the Colenso Parade entrance gates to Botanic Gardens; approached and surrounded with a wide tarmac path which surrounds the stand, with mature trees framing the views and in proximity to the timber shelter adjacent.

Historical information

The bandstand in Botanic Gardens is one of six of the same design that were constructed in Belfast parks in 1925. Although the structure retains its original roof and plinth, together with some of the original frieze (currently (2024) concealed beneath pagoda-style boarding), the bandstand has lost many of its original features. In particular, the original slender supporting columns which were arranged so that the central section on each side projected forwards, provided a high level of detail and interest to the facades. Some of the turned work on the frieze has been replaced, as well as the original railings, these changes having removed much of the structure’s character.

Belfast Botanic Gardens were laid out in the wake of a late 18th and early 19th century upsurge in interest in botany, horticulture and gardening that led to the establishment of botanic gardens in Britain and Ireland. Botanic gardens had been established in Dublin at Glasnevin (1796) and at Ballsbridge (Trinity College, 1806), with the Royal Cork Institution Botanic Garden opening in 1809. Botanic gardens differed from gardens or arboretums constructed solely on aesthetic principles, in that they existed to study and provide instruction in the care and classification of plants, and in horticulture and silviculture. They also served as a show piece for specimens brought back by colonial explorers. The gardens at Glasnevin and Belfast are the only botanic gardens in Ireland from this period to have survived in anything like their original form, although some researchers do not classify Belfast as a ‘true’ botanic garden, as plant collections were not maintained on site.

In February 1827, the Belfast Botanic and Horticultural Society formed under the presidency of the Marquis of Donegall and resolved to lay out a Botanic and Horticultural Garden in Belfast. On 1st May 1829, a lease was signed on a 14-acre site at the junction of Malone and Stranmillis Roads. Funds to establish the gardens were raised through the issuing of shares supplemented by loans and by the end of May 1829, a large number of shrubs and trees had been planted. Admission was charged to the gardens after 1830 for non-members of the Society. For a short period, after 1865, funds were raised in order to allow working people to be admitted free on Saturday afternoons and employers were encouraged to buy free tickets for their employees but these schemes lapsed when Ormeau opened as a free public park in 1871. Entry to Botanic Gardens was, therefore, generally by ticket until the gardens were taken over by the Corporation in 1895, and the number of access points was restricted in order to control revenue.

The first edition OS map of 1832-3 captions the ‘Botanic Gardens’ within a landscape of fields and country houses, approximately a mile outside the town of Belfast. Tree lined paths are shown, following roughly the same layout as today, and two ponds towards the SE end, the lower of which was drained in the 1930s. The former upper pond is now the location of a Japanese sunken garden. Initially there was only one main entrance to the gardens, although the gardens could also be entered along a pathway adjacent to Friars Bush graveyard. Adjacent to the main entrance driveway a small structure, possibly a lodge, is shown, but this was soon replaced by a larger entrance building. A pinetum was established in 1838, to the SE of the main entrance and by 1851 displayed over 170 species of conifers. Adjacent to the pinetum a collection of deciduous and evergreen oaks was planted, some trees from both collections remaining in the park to the present day.

Music was an expected entertainment in parks and gardens and it is known that bands played in Botanic Gardens almost from their inception, the Marquis of Donegall’s band being one of the first, playing on Thursday evenings in the summer of 1830. The first structure to accommodate a band appears to have been a ‘Pavilion’, shown on the large-scale map of 1858, which was erected in 1856 for the visit of ‘Monsieur Jullien’ and his model military band. However, early structures appear to have been of a temporary nature, and it is not until the large-scale map of 1884 that an octagonal ‘bandstand’ is shown on the central lawn.

The distinctive early-Victorian Palm House, also initially known as the conservatory, was designed by Sir Charles Lanyon and partially executed by Richard Turner of Dublin, a pioneer in the use of curved iron ribs and curved glass. The Palm House is one of the earliest surviving examples of curvilinear cast and wrought ironwork, pre-dating Glasnevin and Kew. Turner was engaged as contractor between 1839 and 1840, constructing only the wings of Lanyon’s design, the west wing opening as a cool house and the east wing as a tropical house. In 1840, the Society and Gardens received the title of Royal from Queen Victoria, at the instigation of the Marquis of Donegall.

As Turner subsequently became heavily involved in other projects, Charles Denoon Young (1822-1887), ironworker of Edinburgh, also responsible for the Dublin Exhibition Building (1853) and the Kensington Gore Museum of Science and Art (1856), was engaged to complete Lanyon’s original design for the centre house of the conservatory, with the addition of a dome, some years after the wings were built. The dome, constructed between 1852 and 1853, shows the influence of Turner’s Palm House at Kew which had been completed five years earlier and was glazed by Messrs. H McKendry & Co of Waring Street using Hartley’s patent rolled plate glass.

The second edition map of 1858 captions the ‘Royal Botanic Gardens’ now adjacent to the ‘Queen’s College’ (completed 1849). The College was constructed on grounds adjoining the northern boundary of the gardens and was one of several public buildings to fill the surrounding area in the mid 1800s, the gardens gradually becoming surrounded by the rapid outward expansion of the town. The then newly-completed conservatory was accessed from the main entrance at University Road, where patrons entered the gardens through an entrance building constructed between 1832 and 1858. A second subsidiary entrance to the SW gave access to the curator’s house and a promenade at the SE corner led to the tidal banks of the Lagan. As the area to the NE of the gardens (formerly known as the ‘Plains’) began to be developed for housing, a second lodge (built 1865 and extended to the rear before 1902) and gatescreen were built at a new Botanic Avenue entrance to the park at a cost of £200. Gates costing £75 were put up as a gift of Robert Corry, who was the main developer of housing in the Plains area.

In 1877, the then garden foreman, Charles McKimm, was appointed curator, remaining in the post until his death in 1907. Already projected at the time of McKimm’s appointment was a new gate lodge to the gardens, replacing the earlier entrance building. The initial design, by William Batt (d.1910), who conducted a ‘vigorous practice in the High Victorian style’ (Brett) and designed numerous Belfast churches and villas, as well as Ballynafeigh and Clifton Street Orange Halls, was exhibited at Belfast Industrial Exhibition in 1876. This original design shows a lodge which may have borne a passing resemblance to the existing lodge as it comprised a building with entrance arches through which patrons passed to enter the gardens. However, the Society was forced, most likely for financial reasons, to curtail its ambitions and instructed Batt to prepare fresh plans on a reduced scale. Batt’s amended design for a Venetian gothic lodge was realised and featured a clock tower (a clock was added to the tower c1881) finished with vane and finial of gilt wrought-iron. Ornamental carving on the gate lodge took the forms of birds, flowers and plants such as passion flowers, grape vines, and water lilies. Construction was completed in April 1878, the lodge containing public toilets and ‘commodious’ living accommodation for the gatekeeper. The Society felt that the lodge and gates would form a ‘most attractive feature of the gardens’. They were seen as a ‘credit to the company and an ornament to the town’ and it was hoped, would induce a much larger number of visitors ‘to frequent these grounds and enjoy their beauties’.

The original ornamental wrought-iron gates ‘of very superior design’ were hung on ‘heavy cut-stone piers’ fitted with gilt iron gas standards and glass globes. The wrought iron work at the lodge including the gates was supplied by Messrs. Riddel &Co and the cut stone was ‘of the best description from Dungannon quarries’ – difficulties in getting the stone from the Dungannon quarries had delayed the construction of the lodge. Carving on the capitals of the gate piers is of anemones, primroses, lilies of the valley, pansies and hop blossom. The finials on the two outer piers were intended to resemble the Nile lily and convolvulus. Carving on the lodge and gate piers was by Alexander Stevens, sculptor of Chichester Street, who was active in the 1870s and is also known to have executed carving on the Theatre Royal and on Fitzroy Presbyterian church. The contractors for the lodge and gatescreen were Messrs. Dixon & Co and the cost was £1,300 including the gates.

McKimm’s next major building project was to oversee the construction of a Fernery (now known as the Tropical Ravine and also formerly known as the ‘Intermediate House’ or the Glen) on the site of a former Orchid House and propagating house. Construction took place between 1887 and 1889, largely carried out by McKimm and his gardeners. The fernery, a building of stone walls and a glazed roof enclosing a sunken ravine, was initially roughly half its present length.

Raising money to maintain the gardens was a continual problem which the Society addressed with regular garden fetes and other events, featuring numerous balloon ascents (to facilitate which, a gas pipeline was installed in the main lawn), archery, boats on the Lagan, dancing and band music, firework displays, military tournaments, flower shows and on at least one occasion a ‘submarine explosion’ in one of the ponds. Notable events included a tightrope display by Mr Blondin, the first man to walk across the Niagara Falls on a tightrope and Herr Holtum the ‘Cannon King’ who could catch a cannon ball fired towards him. Political meetings were another regular occurrence, the largest being the Ulster Unionist Convention in 1892 which attracted a crowd estimated at 300,000. Entry and/or hire fees were charged for these events which helped to raise money to maintain the gardens and for new buildings.

Belfast Corporation took over the gardens in 1895, renaming it the Belfast Botanic Gardens Park and opening it free to the public from 1st January of that year. Following a programme of restoration to the palm house, the Corporation extended the Ravine, under McKimm’s supervision, providing a heated lily pond and separating the house into tropical and temperate areas. The new fernery, double the length of the original structure and brick-built with a lantern ridge, was opened in 1902. No architect for the new building is revealed in contemporary sources, but Larmour speculates that the Dutch gable at the E elevation may be the design of William Batt.

Around the time that the Corporation took over the park, the earlier bandstand on the central lawn appears to have been removed. In 1901 the band of the Irish Guards was forced to set up their instruments on the ‘cold, cold ground’ for lack of a bandstand and indeed the 1902 map shows no bandstand within the park. However, the Corporation subsequently began to expand the park and the area between Colenso Parade and the former boundary of the Gardens was acquired after a resolution by Belfast Council in November 1903 to lease an additional c3 acres ‘for the use and enjoyment of the persons inhabiting the city of Belfast’. This area was laid out in parallel walkways (this layout survives), initially planted with roses and known as a ‘rosary’, and in the early 1930s replanted as wide herbaceous borders. A bandstand was built on the newly acquired higher ground near the rosary and was present by 1905, being replaced by the current bandstand, which was positioned slightly further to the W, in 1925.

Belfast Corporation advertised for building contractors for the construction of ‘band stands, wrot-iron railings, gates and cut stone piers in public parks’ in November 1924 and six bandstands were subsequently built to the same design, the bandstands in Woodvale Park and Botanic Gardens being the only ones to survive to the present day (others were constructed in Musgrave Park, Alexandra Park and Victoria Park, the location of the 6th being unknown).

A site for the Belfast Museum and Art Gallery within the garden was reserved in 1912 and the new museum was opened in 1929 with an extension added (completed 1972) that required the former curator’s house (built 1844) to be demolished. Images of the museum shortly after opening show a low wall and railings connecting the museum and the main entrance to the park, replacing the wall of 1887. The museum appears to have retained to the present day its original pre-war gates and railings at the Stranmillis Road entrance.

As the area around the gardens became developed with housing, and the park was extended westwards and southwards, further entrances were opened up. At Agincourt Avenue (now Botanic Court), a wooden gate of c1910 was replaced with the present-day gatescreen in 1925. Two entrances were opened along the newly-built Stranmillis Embankment in 1932 and a gatescreen was installed at Colenso Parade in 1934, replacing an earlier wooden structure.

Although the lodge itself was demolished in 1965, as it had become costly to maintain and no longer appealed to a mid-1960s aesthetic, the stone piers designed by Batt and erected in 1878 survive within the present-day gatescreen. The only other survival of the lodge within the park is a stone, carved with the name ‘Royal Botanic Gardens’ which has been incorporated into a modern brick wall at the Botanic Avenue entrance. The stone was originally built into the wall of the old gate lodge and is shown in images of the building above the right-hand entrance archway. Other parts of the lodge, namely the weathervane and the clock were distributed to members of the public, while the Ulster Museum recovered some of the stonework including a gargoyle and some of the bird and plant sculptures.

After being threatened with demolition, the Palm House benefitted from a major restoration programme in the late 1970s including ironwork cleaning, preservation and replacement where necessary. The Tropical Ravine was soon included in the programme, both buildings being completed simultaneously in May 1983. The Tropical Ravine underwent a further £3.8 million renovation project between 2016 and 2018.

The gardens have gained additional acreage several times as outlined above, however the layout of the original site acquired in 1829 has remained largely unaltered from the 1840s. Although various features have come and gone, elements such as the flower beds shown in the front of the Palm House on the large-scale map of 1873, the open lawn at the centre of the park and some original trees remain in place today. The park remains heavily used for leisure and as a thoroughfare, and the bandstand, although remodelled, continues to perform its original function as a stage for performers from time to time, while new users such as yoga classes, also benefit from the level surface and weather protection it provides.

References:
Primary Sources:
1. PRONI OS/6/1/61/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1832-3)
2. PRONI OS/6/1/61/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1858)
3. PRONI OS/6/1/61/3 – Third Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1901-2)
4. PRONI OS/6/1/61/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1938)
5. Large scale Ordnance Survey maps 1858, 1873, 1884, 1896, 1902, 1903, 1920, 1931, 1937, 1938, 1958, 1959, 1970, 1986 (www.centremapslive.co.uk)
6. Belfast Newsletter, 15th May 1829
7. Belfast Newsletter, 27th August 1830
8. Northern Whig, 23rd May 1840
9. Northern Whig, 1st May 1851
10. Belfast Newsletter 6th December 1852
11. Northern Whig, 29th March 1853
12. Northern Whig, 3rd May 1853
13. Belfast Newsletter, 9th May 1856
14. Belfast Mercury, 14th April 1857
15. Belfast Morning News, 14th February 1866
16. Belfast Newsletter, 12th February 1878
17. Irish Builder Vol 18, 15th May 1876, pp139, 145
18. Irish Builder Vol 18, 15th June 1876, p172
19. Belfast Morning News, 11th February 1879
20. Irish Builder Vol 21, 1st April 1879, pp100, 103
21. Belfast Newsletter, 8th February 1888
22. Northern Whig, 11th September 1889
23. Northern Whig, 18th February 1896
24. Belfast Newsletter, 14th September 1896
25. Northern Whig, 22nd July 1901
26. Belfast Newsletter, 11th September 1902
27. Belfast Newsletter, 7th November 1903
28. Belfast Telegraph, 1st November 1910
29. Belfast Newsletter, 19th October 1911
30. Belfast Telegraph, 18th June 1923
31. Belfast Newsletter, 21st November 1924
32. Belfast Newsletter, 8th January 1925
33. Belfast Telegraph, 4th March 1925
34. Belfast Newsletter, 17th February 1932
35. Northern Whig, 6th May 1932
36. Belfast Newsletter, 21st June 1932
37. Northern Whig, 4th February 1933
38. Northern Whig, 31st March 1933
39. Belfast Telegraph, 6th April 1933
40. Belfast Newsletter, 23rd January 1934
41. Belfast Newsletter, 10th June 1954
42. BBC Rewind: Botanic Gardens Loo (bbcrewind.co.uk)(1965)
43. Belfast Newsletter, 11th January 1965
44. Belfast Telegraph, 13th August 1965
45. Belfast Telegraph, 14th September 1965
46. Belfast Telegraph, 24th September 1965
47. Belfast Newsletter, 8th December 1972
48. Belfast Telegraph, 25th August 1973
49. Belfast Newsletter, 21st June 1989

Secondary Sources:

50. Brett, Charles E B (1985) Buildings of Belfast 1700-1914. Belfast: Friar’s Bush Press
51. Dictionary of Irish Architects www.dia.ie
52. Hix, John. (1974) The Glass House. London: Phaidon Press
53. Larmour, Paul (1987) Belfast: an illustrated architectural guide. Belfast: Friar’s Bush Press
54. McCracken, Eileen (1971) The Palm House and Botanic Garden, Belfast. Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society
55. Parks Committee of Belfast City Council (c1983) Botanic Gardens: The Belfast Botanic Gardens Park (Commemorative Pamphlet)
56. London Parks and Gardens www.londongardenstrust.org
57. National Library of Ireland https://catalogue.nli.ie/
58. National Museums Northern Ireland https://collections.nationalmuseumsni.org/
59. Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesnes of Special Historic Interest in Northern Ireland (2022) Historic Environment Division Publication
60. Scott, Robert (2000) A breath of fresh air: the story of Belfast’s parks. Belfast: Blackstaff Press

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Alteration work to support columns, replacement railings and enclosure of previously open, high level “lattice” work has resulted in the structure not having sufficient remaining historic fabric to meet the legislative test for listing.