Direct Wine Shipments

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Terraced symmetrical three-storey stucco-fronted building, built c.1860. Rectangular on plan facing north with three-storey rendered return and enclosed rear yard.

Pitched corrugated iron roof with red brick chimneystack to the east. Cast-iron rainwater goods. Painted stucco rendered walling to front elevation, painted render to remaining elevations. Square-headed window openings with architrave surrounds and single-pane timber sash windows (unless otherwise stated).

Symmetrical front elevation is three windows wide with a central recessed bay and parapet rising from stepped cornice. Both breakfronts have moulded quoins and continuous moulded sill courses to the second floor and framing the channel-rusticated ground floor with moulded plinth course. Tripartite window openings to both breakfronts having Doric moulded mullions. Replacement glazing to both ground floor display windows and a central stepped round-headed door opening flanked by a pair of large scrolled console brackets and a replacement timber door with plain fanlight. Door opens onto two limestone steps to the front pavement.

East side elevation abutted by adjoining infill building, partially advanced with returning quoins and mouldings visible. Further square-headed door opening to the right with a replacment timber paneled door and overlight.

Rear elevation abutted by gable-ended three-storey rendered return having a pitched corrugated iron roof, rendered walling and square-headed window and door openings with replacement windows and doors to the east elevation only fronting into a small paved yard with steel fire escape.

Blank west side elevation with cornice and quoins returning from the front elevation. Suspended commercial bill board to the upper level and graffiti art to the ground floor.

Setting

Located on the south side of Corporation Square with the flyover M3 motorway curving along the rear site. Access to internal yard via a side street.

Roof : profiled metal
RWG : Cast-iron
Walling: Painted stucco
Windows: Timber

Historical information

Numbers 5 -7 (formerly number 7) Corporation Square is thought to date from c1860, replacing an earlier building shown on the site on the first edition OS map of 1832-3 (Patton). The current building was associated with Belfast’s maritime history for many years and in the late nineteenth century was occupied by distillers, retaining the link with the wine and spirit trade to this day.

Corporation Square was, from at least 1819, the location of Ritchie’s Dock built by William Ritchie of Aberdeenshire who located his shipyard to the north. By 1833 the south side of the dock had been developed and in 1848 the dock itself was filled in, the area being renamed Corporation Square after the ‘Corporation for the preservation of the Port and Harbour of Belfast’, later the Harbour Board (Patton).

Patton dates the current building to c1860, apparently on a stylistic basis, but the building potentially retains early nineteenth century fabric from former structures on the site. From 1852 Mrs Nugent kept a boarding house for sailors at number 7, while the neighbouring house was occupied by Allen Watters whose bakery produced ‘shipbread’, a kind of hard, saltless biscuit that was in demand as on-board provisions. By 1855 Mrs Nugent was sharing her premises with James Lemon, a ship owner, chandler and rope and canvas manufacturer with a factory in Ballymacarrett who was ultimately to build himself a substantial mansion in Holywood known as ‘Ardville’ (HB23/18/040). It is likely that it was James Lemon who rebuilt/remodelled the premises c1860 and Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64) lists the property as a warehouse, rope and ship stores and yard with an office and shop on the ground floor, two rooms on the first floor and a sail loft in the attic. The building was valued at £150.

Lemon had taken over the whole building and gone into partnership with Morrow by the late 1870s but eventually faded from the business which was being run as Morrow, Miskelly & Co by 1887 (Street Directories). Valuer’s notes record that the top storey of the building was added or replaced in 1911.

Number seven became the premises of Doran & Co distillers in the 1890s, the Doran family all residing at Greenview in Dunmurry and later moving to the Malone Road. The building was subsequently taken over by Ekin, Robertson and Peacock, wholesale seed merchants (by 1920) and then by a succession of light industries such as clothing and upholstery, reflecting the decline of shipping in the area. The 1980s saw the premises again in use as a wine store and today the building is occupied by a wine shipping company (Street Directories).

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/1/61/1 – First Edition OS Map 1832-3
2. PRONI OS/6/1/61/3 – Third Edition OS Map 1858
3. PRONI OS/6/1/61/4 – Fourth Edition OS Map 1901-2
4. PRONI OS/6/1/61/6 – Sixth Edition OS Map 1931
5. PRONI VAL/2/B/7/2B – Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64)
6. PRONI VAL/7/B/9/9 Belfast Revaluation 1900
7. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/C/1-45 (1863-1930)
8. Street Directories (1852-1995)

Secondary Sources

1. Patton, M “Central Belfast: An Historical Gazetteer” Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1993

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

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

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Terraced symmetrical three-storey stucco-fronted building built c1860. Much historic fabric and detailing survive, including the original warehouse structure, and later changes that reflect its changing use. This building and its history represent the development and changing fortunes of the harbour area in the mid to late Victorian era and is one of the few survivors of a modest scale in the locale. It is of good quality and a good example of a type that is fast disappearing.