Drumadarragh House, 2 Drumadarragh Road, Doagh, Ballyclare, Co Antrim, BT39 0TA

Drumadarragh House is a large, two-storey rendered Georgian farmhouse with attics, set in an extensive rural estate in the townland of Walkmill. The house has a complex building history: according to the Ordnance Survey Memoirs, a single-storey house stood on this site from 1641, was rebuilt in 1742, and then substantially rebuilt again in 1827, when a lease was granted to George Langtry, for whom the present house was designed by architect Patrick Allen. It is believed, though not confirmed by internal inspection, that the present three-bay central block of the north (entrance) front dates from the 1742 rebuilding, and that the gabled wings to either side were added in 1827. A two-storey rear return was added in 1903 for Thomas Dixon (later Sir Thomas Dixon), in a sympathetic style. Langtry ownership ended in 1886; Thomas Dixon purchased the property in 1891, using it as an occasional residence alongside his other homes at Graymount in Belfast and Ravensdale in County Louth. The house was requisitioned by the army during the Second World War and subsequently returned to private ownership by another branch of the Dixon family. The outbuildings appear on the Ordnance Survey map of 1832.

The house is built in a vernacular Georgian style with the proportions characteristic of that period. Its walls are finished in wet-dash roughcast render throughout, with smooth cement-rendered projecting plinths, flush quoins to the wings, and flush rendered surrounds to the window and door openings. The roofs are covered in natural slates laid in regular courses and retain original rooflights. Rainwater goods include a moulded gutter to the entrance front, with PVC downpipes at each extremity of the central recess, and two cast iron soil pipes. There are two chimneys, one at each extremity of the central block.

The main entrance faces north. The central block of the north elevation is recessed and symmetrically arranged, three bays wide, with a central entrance set within an elliptical arched opening. The door itself is a rectangular timber 12-panelled door, flanked by panelled timber pilasters with rectangular three-pane sidelights to each side, and surmounted by an elliptical fanlight with looped and radial glazing bars. The doorstep is of concrete and stone and is flanked by large statues of dogs. The roof of the central block has a deep overhang between the projecting side wings, with a timber sheeted soffit. Two small four-pane circular windows (oculi) are set at ground floor level at each extremity of the central bay. All windows throughout this elevation are rectangular timber vertically-hung sliding sash, six panes over six, without horns, set in smooth rendered and painted reveals with projecting concrete cills. The windows contain mainly crown glass.

The projecting wing to the right of the entrance front is two windows wide across both main floors, with sash windows as described above and a larger four-pane oculus in the gable apex. Its walling matches the central block, with projecting rendered copings to the gables and flush verges to the slated roof. Two circular cast iron soil pipes are positioned between the main windows. The wing to the left is similar, but has a lean-to extension to its left-hand side, containing one small four-over-four rectangular timber sliding sash window with horns at an intermediate floor level, and a small oculus above similar to those of the central block; metal and PVC waste pipes are present. The lean-to extension walling matches the main wing and has two cast iron soil pipes. To the left of the lean-to extension, a lean-to shed connects to the outbuildings via a rubble basalt wall.

The east side of this lean-to extension presents a blank roughcast wall. Its south side is two storeys: at ground floor there is a rectangular ledged timber door, and at first floor a rectangular four-panel door reached by a steel fire escape stairway. There is also a small rectangular metal window at ground floor level, a replacement for the original timber sash. The ground floor doorway leads into an outside toilet and storeroom, with concrete floors, whitened brick and rubble walls, and a lath and plaster ceiling in poor condition below the concrete floor above.

The east elevation of the house is two storeys with an attic, finished in walling to match the entrance front. At ground floor, a rectangular timber six-panel door is approached by three concrete steps and is flanked by two rectangular sash windows matching those of the entrance front. One similar window appears at first floor level with a projecting cill that has been fractured. At attic level, a rectangular glazed and panelled door opens onto a steel fire escape. The landing of the fire escape stairway is enclosed by a timber construction with a ledged timber door in its south side leading onto the steel stairs, and a four-pane fixed light in the east side. The east side of this structure is clad in asbestos slates, with a boarded underside to the stairway in the angle with the lean-to extension. PVC downpipes serve the lean-to extension, and an aluminium gutter with a PVC downpipe is fitted to the east elevation of the house.

The rear (south) elevation of the main house is two storeys with attics. The roof matches the entrance front but lacks the deep overhang and soffit of the central block. The wall to the right of the rear return has an aluminium gutter and PVC gutter to the central bay, and walling as before, with a rendered projecting chimney stack approximately one and a half storeys high added to the central bay and a full-height modern metal flue to its right. The central bay has two windows to each floor, matching those of the entrance front. The gable of the wing to the right is in the same plane and has an oculus in the attic similar to the entrance front, two first-floor windows, and one at ground floor, all as before. The rear entrance comprises a rectangular nine-panel timber door with original iron handles, surmounted by a semi-circular radial fanlight, set in a continuous flush smooth rendered and painted surround. Three modern concrete steps are flanked by modern tubular steel handrails. At the right-hand extremity of the rear elevation, a later lean-to single-storey block projects, slated to match the main house, with roughcast walls, round-chamfered smooth rendered corners, a rectangular single-pane fixed timber light, a three-light ventilator opening, a flush timber door, and a PVC gutter with PVC downpipe.

The rear return projects southward from the rear elevation and is two storeys high with a hipped slated roof. On its east elevation there is a projecting rendered chimney breast approximately one and a half storeys high, with angled weathering at the top; the chimney above rises from the roof with a smooth cement-rendered base carrying a brick chimney with two red pots. To the right of the chimney breast, there is one narrow rectangular six-over-six sash window with horns to each floor. An aluminium gutter with a PVC downpipe is fitted, along with two cast iron soil pipes. The south elevation of the rear return has two windows at first floor and three at ground floor, with the central ground-floor window larger; all are six-over-six sash windows with horns. Aluminium gutter with PVC downpipe.

The west elevation of the rear return has an elliptically arched entrance to the left and a shallow projecting two-storey gabled rectangular bay to the right. The entrance consists of a rectangular timber 12-panel door set between panelled pilasters, flanked by three-pane sidelights on low plinth walls, and surmounted by an elliptical fanlight with looped and radial glazing bars, all recessed in a smooth rendered and painted flush surround. Above the doorway is a rectangular six-over-six sash window with horns. The projecting bay to the right has three windows to each floor, with the central windows wider, all rectangular six-over-six sash windows with horns. A blind oculus occupies the gable apex. An aluminium gutter with PVC downpipe is fitted to the left-hand wall of the bay.

The rear gable of the west wing of the main block, which forms the rear elevation to the left of the rear return, is similar to its front gable but without soil pipes.

The west elevation of the house is two storeys, with a slated roof whose ridges at the wings incline upwards at each gable. Three original flush rooflights are retained. Walling matches the entrance front, including quoins at the extremities. A moulded aluminium gutter with a PVC downpipe is fitted to the left-hand side, along with cast iron soil pipes. There are two windows at ground floor and one at first floor, all rectangular sash windows as on the entrance front.

The house stands in a very rural setting within its own extensive grounds, facing the road but set back slightly from it, with a gravelled area immediately in front approached through a pair of modern timber gates. Mature trees form part of the front boundary on each side. To the east and south, extensive outbuildings are grouped around yards enclosed by basalt rubble walls, approached by a recessed driveway to the north and a gateway to the east. To the south and west, an informal garden with lawns and shrubs is enclosed to the front and west boundaries by basalt rubble walls. The garden contains a lean-to greenhouse in poor condition and a two-storey rubble stone garden shed.

The outbuildings are grouped around two main yards — a northern one and a southern one — with a smaller yard immediately to the rear of the house opening off the northern yard. The small rear yard has on its north side a two-storey outbuilding linked to the east gable of the house, with white rendered walls and a hipped slated roof, used as a store; the east wall facing the northern yard is of exposed rubble, with Georgian glazing to a later inserted window, and a lean-to wooden gabled shed along its north side. The south side of the small rear yard is occupied by a single-storey block with basalt walls and a hipped slated roof, with an elliptically arched entrance in the west wall containing double doors. The northern yard originally contained coach houses, stables, and grooms' accommodation; the southern yard was a farmyard with cattle housing, implement storage, and feed storage. An outbuilding on the south-west side of the northern yard originally contained the dairy with churning and butter-making machinery. The northern yard currently contains stores and garages, with a portion at the north-east corner converted into a dwelling. The southern yard remains as farm sheds but is no longer in full use. The outbuildings around both yards are generally two storeys high, in random rubble with natural slate hipped or gable-end roofs. Rainwater goods are in cast iron except where later replaced in PVC. Windows are mainly timber vertically-hung sliding sashes, with some casements and some metal casement replacements. Entrance doors are traditional framed and sheeted. Some arched doorways in the southern yard are now derelict; others have been partly blocked to accommodate modern rectangular windows. The outbuildings generally are of little or no special architectural interest, have undergone many alterations, and some blocks are of poor original quality and in very poor condition.