259 Crumlin Road

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Detached redbrick office building, built c.1885, with associated red sandstone ashlar gabled arch. Located on the north side of Crumlin Road with a short stretch of setts beyond the arch and single-storey brick structure enclosing the lane to the west, built c.1950. Rectangular on plan facing south with front walled area and large bitmac paved rear yard.

Flat roof not visible with a rendered chimneystack rising from the east elevation and a futher redbrick chimneystack rising from the west elevation. Guttering hidden behind decorative sandstone carved drip cornice on moulded brick eaves course, returning to the side elevations. Cast-iron hoppers and downpipes breaking through brick parapet to the rear and side elevations. Redbrick walls laid in Flemish bond with projecting brick plinth course, flush sandstone courses and continuous sandstone sill courses to both floors. Gauged brick square-headed window openings with bull-nosed reveals and original timber casement windows.

Front elevation is three windows wide with a central door opening. Windows grouped in threes to the west bay and in pairs to the east bay. Shoulder-headed window openings to the ground floor are surmounted by round-headed panels formed in bull-nosed voussoired sandstone and redbrick having plain sandstone label mouldings with carved stops. Three-centred-arched door opening with compound moulded sandstone and redbrick surround housing a square-headed door opening with bowtel surround, sandstone lintel, hardwood door with nine raised-and-fielded panels, large plain-glazed overlight and a hood moulding with label stops. Door opens onto two concrete steps.

West side elevation is four pairs of camber-headed windows wide to ground floor with bipartite timber casement windows, some having original leaded stained glazing with swivel panels. Three first floor windows aligned above with exception of north end, where wall shows signs of having been rebuilt.

Rear elevation has paired window to first floor right and window to left, all with stop-chamfered concrete lintels and sills and replacement timber windows. Central square-headed door opening with original timber panelled door and rectangular overlight; large carriage arch to workshop at left side, with flat arch head.

Pebbledash cement rendered east side elevation with a pair of window openings to the first floor and a door opening to the ground floor.

Abutting the southwest corner of the front elevation is a short red brick screen wall with stone coping and three blind panels, connecting to the gabled arch to the fore. Double-height three-centred arch and gable over built in coursed squared red sandstone ashlar surmounted by moulded coping and a ball finial. Square panel to the gable has two pieces of carved timber. Hood moulding to the arch with bull-nosed surround, moulded plinths with cast-iron wheel-guards. Either side of the arch is a large scrolled sandstone bracket with volute carving resting on redbrick walls to either side. The wall to the west is terminated by a tall redbrick pier with sandstone capstone. Replacement steel gates open into a short stretch of lane having original setts and iron weighbridge. To the rear the arch is abutted by a pair of stepped buttresses with a flat-roofed single-storey redbrick structure enclosing the lane to the west.

Setting

Located on the north side of Crumlin Road with a small front area enclosed by replacement redbrick wall and a bitmac drive running along the east side elevation opening into a large bitmac yard lined with late twentieth-century industrial structures. The arch opens into a further paved yard in different ownership.

Roof Flat
RWG Cast-iron
Walling brick
Windows timber

Historical information

The current building was constructed as offices c1885 at the entrance to the building yard of James Henry & Sons, a highly successful contractor responsible for some of Belfast’s most well-known structures including Bank Buildings, both the Presbyterian and Methodist churches in Carlisle Circus, the Albert Bridge and the Reform Club. When the firm expanded their premises c1885 and built the current office, James Henry, who resided at ‘Albertville’, had recently died (Will of James Henry) and his sons Robert Boyd Henry and Hugh Henry had taken over the firm. (www.dia.ie) The firm was founded by James Henry’s father, Hugh Henry, c1830 and the Crumlin Road site was first established after 1857. (Industries of the North; OS maps)

Robert Boyd Henry was a JP and an active member of the Belfast Master Builders’ Association and the Belfast Chamber of Commerce. He was also a keen sportsman and belonged to the Royal Ulster Yacht Club, the North of Ireland Cricket Club and the County Down Stag Hunt. (www.dia.ie) The firm was able to profit from the dizzying expansion of Belfast towards the end of the nineteenth century, in particular the construction of large numbers of red-brick terraces on the outskirts of the city. Having expanded into the present vacant plot on the Crumlin Road, the firm set about building terraced housing on the roadside while developing their premises into the yard to the rear.

The plot, which is shown as vacant on the large-scale town plan of 1883-4 was adjacent to the premises of John Henry & Co to the west and was fully developed by 1901-3 with the present building shown beside the entrance to the builder’s yard and terraced housing on either side. The building is listed in the valuation fieldbook dating from 1882-96 but is not distinguished from other structures on the site for valuation purposes. James Henry & Son’s holding is listed as land, a coachman’s house, offices, workshops, shed and builder’s yard. The initial valuation is £102, but development of the site was ongoing and the valuation rises continually from 1884 onwards reaching £450 in 1899. The site was leased from John Blakiston-Houston.

The revaluation of Belfast in 1900 gives a detailed plan of the office and builder’s yard showing that in addition to the current building, used as an office, the buildings comprised a paint shop, stables, stone sawing shed with a powerful Robey steam engine of 20 horse power, machine room, mortar mill, joiner’s shop, sawmill and smithy, engine house, boiler house and plant store. There were also several cranes in the yard giving the facility of handling heavy weights, particularly stone that they obtained from their own quarries at Scrabo. Sheds for the seasoning of timber held a large stock of wood that could be sawed, planed and moulded on site. The firm employed about 400 hands on and off the site at Crumlin Road. (Valuation notes; Industries of the North)

The premises was taken over by W M Wilton, in 1934 and the company, a funeral furnisher, florist, monumental sculptor and carrier, remained in the building until 1990. Since 1991 the site has been occupied by Stewarts Carpet Warehouse but the current building is the offices and warehouse of Brian Barrett Signs. (www.brianbarrettsigns.co.uk; Street Directories)

References

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/8/30/3/14 - Belfast Town Plan 1883-4
2. PRONI OS/8/30/5/35 - Belfast Town Plan 1901-3
3. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/C/1-31 Annual Revisions (1863-1905)
4. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/F/1-7 Annual Revisions (1905-1930)
5. PRONI VAL/7/B/1/7 Belfast Revaluation 1900-1
6. PRONI Will of James Henry, died 17th February 1882
7. Street Directories 1900-1995

Secondary Sources

1. “Industries of the North One Hundred Years Ago” Belfast: Friar’s Bush Press, 1986 (First published as ‘Industries of Ireland, Part 1. Belfast and the Towns of the North’ in 1891)
2. www.brianbarrettsigns.co.uk
3. www.dia.ie

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

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Detached red brick office building, built c.1885, with associated red sandstone ashlar gabled arch. Rectangular on plan this building exhibits some examples of good stonemasonry skills and much historic fabric survives, despite the loss of interior detail. The quality is matched in the associated gabled arch. It is of interest as an early office building associated with a well-known firma of builders associated with several major developments in Victorian Belfast.

General comments

The address previously recorded for this structure was wrong - it was previously recorded as 255 Crumlin Road.