166-174 North Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Corner-sited symmetrical five-bay three-storey former drawing school and commercial building with attic, dated 1899, terminating the north-west end of North Street, at the junction with Millfield, in central Belfast. Rectangular on plan with L-shaped rear stairwell and WC extension, further abutted by substantial former warehouse to S, partially canted at S end.

Mansard slate roof, covered to principal elevation by a continuous attic extension, c.1970. Cast-iron rainwater goods, no chimneystacks. Roof of warehouse to rear is flat with rooflights, partially supporting a telecommunications installation. English garden wall bonded red brick walling to upper floors, shopped to ground floor, red sandstone and granite dressings. Windows have flush chamfered sandstone surrounds (a number of transoms are missing), generally aluminium replacements to façade; plain surrounds with timber casements to north elevation and rear.

Principal elevation faces North, symmetrically arranged with narrower central entrance bay. Upper floors are divided into full height canted bays separated by red brick piers; each has a profiled parapet, that to centre having carved sandstone embellishment. Terracotta datestone placed between second and third floors at central bay, smaller terracotta panels to either side. Continuous sandstone cills to each floor. Ground floor has two shop units to either side of central entrance, divided by semi-engaged polished red granite hexagonal columns on grey granite plinth blocks, carrying staged piers with acanthus leaf detail (all assumed to be sandstone, but generally painted over); profiled finals pierce a cavetto sandstone cornice spanning the entire ground floor. Shop units are covered by roller shutters; tall two-tier fascias over may conceal original shop frontage. Central entrance having corniced lintel, semi-circular fanlight, embellished sandstone panel over; carved sandstone lions sit over the entrance, clasping shields.

Front block is fully abutted on East side by the adjoining building, Nos 156-164 North Street (HB26/50/317).

West gable of front block (onto Law's Court & Millfield) is plainly detailed with a single window opening to extreme right side of both first and second floor levels. Large signage to left side of windows at first and second floor levels.

Rear (South) elevation of front block is exposed to right side only above ground floor level and is plainly detailed, with regular rows of windows and wall head dormers lighting attic; windows are generally camber-headed with some replacement flat concrete lintels. It is abutted by returns to left side, which are in turn abutted by the warehouse to rear.

The warehouse main elevations face West onto Law's Court & Millfield and South onto Samuel Street, and are plainly detailed with rows of regularly spaced windows to each floor. The south elevation has a metal fire escape stair to right side and much of the ground floor level is abutted by a single-storey brick lean-to extension with a corrugated metal roof.
East elevation of warehouse is set back from rear block and also has rows of regularly spaced windows to each floor (apart from ground floor which is within flat roofed section linking front and rear blocks); projecting block at south end has a blank east elevation.

Setting:
Prominent corner location on North Street and Millfield in the northern section of central Belfast, east of the former Smithfield market site. The building fronts directly onto the North Street pavement, and is abutted on its East side by a similarly scaled late nineteenth century commercial building (Nos 156-164 North Street - HB26/50/317). It is abutted at the rear by a substantial former warehouse which faces West onto Law's Court & Millfield and south onto Samuel Street.

Roof: Slate
Walling: Brick
Windows: Aluminium

Historical information

Built c.1899 for the developer Francis Curley, 166-174 North Street was designed by architect William Gilliland. The building was known in the early part of the 20th century as ‘Merchant’s Buildings.’ Francis Curley was a clerical and merchant tailor with premises at 16 North Street, and was also a property developer engaged in the construction of commercial and residential buildings across Belfast. He lived at ‘Dunedin Terrace,’ 397 Antrim Road. Comprising four ground floor shopfronts, a series of halls to the upper floors and expansive warehousing and offices to the rear off Law’s Court, the valuations and street directories show Merchant’s Buildings have been occupied a varied series of businesses over the past century.

The most notable early tenant was the Municipal School of Art, a branch of the Municipal Technical Institute. The school transferred its headquarters from College Square North to North Street on 26th September 1901, occupying the upper floors of Merchant’s Buildings until the opening of the new purpose built Belfast Technical institute, back on College Square North, in 1906. Early occupants of the ground floor shopfronts included Kerr’s Miliners at no. 166 and the Belfast Co-operative Society Ltd., ‘gent’s outfitting and boot and shoe warehouse’ at no.170-4. The sole tenant of the warehouse to the rear during this time is recorded as G. Bolton & Co., ‘manufacturers of boys washing suits and blouses, girls washing blouses, tunics, etc.’ until 1905, when they shared the premises with Patrick Bros., ‘printer’s engineers.’ Davidson and McCormick, ‘general bookbinders, printers and commercial stationers’ occupied no.170 from 1907, with the Belfast Co-operative Society Ltd. remaining in no.172-4 until 1912 when Francis Curley, who remained as lessor of the building during this time, is recorded as being the occupant of no. 172. The street directories record that by 1908 a George Dodds had been employed as a caretaker, residing in a room allocated for this purpose on the third floor, replaced the following year by a George Foy.

While the tenancy of the building changed frequently over the years, there were several long-standing tenants. These included the International Stores at no.168, which began life in 1918 as Henry G. Gibson and Co., ‘stationer, bookseller and publisher of religious literature,’ becoming international exporters and stationers under proprietor M.J.Gibson in 1923, eventually closing in 1940. Another long-standing occupant was Sam McCrudden & Company, linen manufacturers, who occupied no.170 from the mid 1920s until 1963 and ran a laundry to the rear warehouses with an employee’s entrance on Law’s Court. The valuations record that, in 1930 McCrudden occupied the second-floor hall over nos.166-74, two offices at no.174 along with warerooms to the third floor and attic. The Irish Builder records that, after a fire in 1934, the rear warehouses were renovated by Charles Macalister, an architect who worked closely with developer Francis Curley and in whose Whitehall Buildings he had his office for some years.

During the 1960s and 70s nos.166-68 was occupied by Cash and Carry furnishing company, with Thomas Beggs and Co., booksellers and stationers occupying no.170 and a portion of the warehouses to the rear. By 1975 the units fronting north street are recorded as being entirely vacant, with Beggs and Co. maintaining warehouse facilities to the rear. A series of short-lived retail outlets occupied the units over the following decade, and in 1988 the Manor Snooker Hall and social club opened to the upper floors, operating until the late 1990s. Barewood Architectural Salvage opened to the rear warehouses on Laws Court c.1994 and remains the building's only tenant at the time of survey.

Belfast City Council Building Control archive drawings show that drawings were completed by TT Houston Architects in 1961 for a refurbishment scheme which included the removal of the five original brick dormer windows along the front elevation to be removed and replaced with a continuous flat roof dormer. Drawings of 1975 by Houston Bell & Kennedy Architects proposed the re-glazing of the windows to the continuous dormer and new shop fronts.

In 2001 a planning application was granted to erect radio masts, antennae and mobile phone transmitter equipment on the roof of the rear warehouses, with further applications to upgrade the equipment granted in 2003 and 2013.

Primary Sources

1. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/C/18 General Valuation of Ireland, General Revisions 1897-1905
2. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/33 General Valuation of Ireland, General Revisions 1906-1914
3. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/C/37 General Valuation of Ireland, General Revisions 1913-1925
4. PRONI VAL/12/B/43/41 General Valuation of Ireland, General Revisions 1924-1930
5. Patton, Marcus ‘Central Belfast: An Historical Gazetteer,’ UAHS, 2015
6. Bell, Henry V., ‘Diligence and Skill: 100 years of education at Belfast Institute,’ PUBLISHER?, 2006

Online sources

1. Dictionary of Irish Architects (http://www.dia.ie/works/view/45746/building/CO.+ANTRIM%2C+BELFAST%2C+NORTH+STREET+%28%26+LAW%27S+CT%29%2C+PREMISES)

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
F. Structural System
G. Innovatory Qualities
H-. Alterations detracting from building
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
X. Local Interest
V. Authorship

Evaluation

166-174 North Street and 176 Law's Court is a four-storey five-bay former commercial building incorporating substantial former warehouses to rear, dated 1899, and prominently located at the west end of North Street. It is a landmark building when viewed from Millfield and Carrick Hill, and is one of three remaining late Victorian buildings surviving in this former historic commerical area, thus providing important historic context. Architecturally, the building is typical of the period, of red brick with good quality terracotta detailing, and symmetrically arranged. The shopfronts contain a blend of materials, and it is likely that additional original fabric remains beneath later boxing. Internally, the building is well-appointed to maximise commercial usage, as testified by the range of historical uses and tenants associated with the building, which contribute to the understanding of North Street as once vibrant and fluid commercial area. Of particular interest is the attic floor of the front portion of the building, which served as Belfast's Municipal School of Art from 1901 to 1907, prior to its relocation to the Belfast Institute of Technology at College Square North. The room is unusually configured within a set of innovatory semi-circular cast-iron trusses without bracing, which are both rare and of technical interest. As the location of the former Art School, as well as a centre of commerce, the building is also of social and cultural interest.