The Lodge, Greenmount College, 22 Greenmount Road, Muckamore, Antrim, Co Antrim, BT41 4PX

The Lodge at Greenmount College is an early 20th century house of distinctive form and style, built around 1925 as a residence for the principal of Greenmount Agricultural College. It was designed by Roland Ingleby Smith, chief architect to the Government of Northern Ireland, with contractors T. McKee and Sons of Belfast. The building is now used as offices, having ceased to be used as a residence in 1993. It forms part of an interesting group with other college buildings of similar materials and architectural idiom, including a 19th century classical house with a contemporary basalt wing.

The Lodge is a two-storey building constructed in roughly coursed basalt rubble with later reticulated pointing, designed in a late Arts and Crafts style. The roof is of green Westmorland slates in diminishing courses with black ridge tiles, overhanging eaves with flat white-painted soffits, cast iron gutters and downpipes. Walls feature a tooled edge to extremities and corners of reveals to openings, a raised sandstone platband at window head height to ground floor, and a narrow projecting sandstone eaves course to first floor. Two chimneys of basalt rubble have projecting sandstone stringcourses at their bases.

The main entrance faces south and the south elevation is asymmetrical. To the left of an off-centre doorway is a canted single storey bay of dressed sandstone on a low basalt rubble plinth, with a low pitched hipped roof of Westmorland green slates. Windows to the canted bay are rectangular timber sliding sash, 1 over 1 with horns, featuring sandstone keystones to each face and projecting sandstone cills, with a moulded cast iron gutter. The main entrance itself is a new rectangular timber 6-panel door, raised and fielded, with a new unmoulded timber frame set in a rusticated sandstone surround, partly trimmed in modern cement render, with a sandstone flat arch head recessed in an opening with basalt reveals and a basalt flat arch to the head. A concrete doorstep flanks a pair of original sandstone plant tubs of simplified classical design in an Art Deco idiom; the tub to the right of the doorway has been broken but bound together with wire. Above the entrance is a first floor window, a rectangular timber sliding sash 6 over 6 with horns, with exposed sash boxes, set in a plain reveal with a recessed cill and the eaves soffit to the head. To the right of the entrance is a small rectangular metal 6-pane side-hung casement with a recessed cill and sandstone platband to the head. Set back slightly to the right-hand side of the south elevation, the end bay curves round to the east in a quadrant, forming the main exterior feature of the composition. The curved bay has a roof with a chimney at its apex and one window to each floor. The first floor window is a sashed 6 over 6 with horns, plain reveals and recessed cill, with a segmental headed flat arch of basalt voussoirs to the head. The ground floor window is similar but sashed 3 over 6 and has an angled head to the flat arch.

The west elevation comprises the west gable and is two-storey with two windows to each floor. The walling and chimney are as described for the entrance front. First floor windows are sashed 8 over 8 with horns and segmental heads to flat arches. Ground floor windows are tripartite, sashed 6 over 6 to central lights and 2 over 2 to sidelights, with angled heads to flat arches.

The rear elevation has roof, walls and rainwater goods as the entrance front. Three windows to the first floor are detailed as previously: two sashed 6 over 6 and one sashed 3 over 3. Two windows to the ground floor consist of one sashed 6 over 6 with an angled head to flat arch, and one small metal 6-pane casement in plain basalt reveals with a recessed cill. Projecting forward at the left-hand side is a single storey rear return with a hipped roof of pale green tinted tiles, basalt rubble walling with reticulated pointing and tooled edges to main corners, a sandstone frieze returning from the platband of the main block, overhanging eaves with a flat soffit of white-painted sheeting, timber fascia, cast iron gutter and downpipes. The west side of the rear return has what appear to be new openings with untooled edges to reveals: one deeply recessed rectangular timber sashed window 3 over 6 with horns in exposed sash boxes and a lead-dressed cill board, and to the right a deeply recessed doorway containing a pair of double doors glazed with small panes, flanked by sidelights sashed 2 over 4 with lead-dressed cill boards, with a concrete doorstep leading onto a modern concrete paved patio bounded partly by modern concrete brick walling. The north end of the rear return has a doorway containing a glazed modern flush timber door deeply recessed in plain reveals with a rusted flat steel lintel to the head, with an old concrete doorstep leading onto a small modern concrete flagged area bounded by modern concrete brick walls. The east side of the rear return contains a deeply recessed glazed small-pane timber door flanked by coupled and tripled sliding sashed windows, each light 2 over 4 with horns and lead-covered cill boards; tooled edges to reveals appear to the right-hand side and to the doorway but the arrangement may not be original. The east elevation of the main block projects slightly beyond the rear return and comprises a symmetrical end bay with a quadrant bay set back slightly to the left and curved round to the front elevation as previously described. The main end bay has one window to each floor, sashed as previously noted, with small PVC waste pipes at the base.

The building has undergone some inappropriate alterations but enjoys a pleasant setting within the grounds of the agricultural college. It stands detached near the nucleus of the college, approached by a tarmac driveway leading to a tarmac car parking area to the east side, otherwise surrounded by well-kept lawns and flower beds with mature trees beyond. Standing detached to the north and separated by a concrete paved passageway is a later single storey garage with a hipped roof of modern green tinted tiles, a basalt rubble entrance front with wet-dashed walls to the sides and rear, panelled sheet metal garage doors with rectangular timber small-paned fixed lights and vents, and ledged timber doors to sides and rear, cast iron gutters and downpipes, and a modern steel and timber car port attached to the north side with modern timber fencing beyond. The listing extends to include the pair of original stone plant tubs at the main entrance.