Abbey House, Whiteabbey Hospital, Station Road, Newtownabbey, Co Antrim, BT37 9RH

A substantial two-storey Italianate stucco house built around 1855 to designs by Sir Charles Lanyon, located within the grounds of Whiteabbey Hospital Complex. The building is now vacant. It is square on plan facing south, with a rectangular wing to the west, a lower L-shaped block with bowed projection to the front, and a long two-storey range extending north dating to around 1880.

The main structure features hipped natural slate roofs with leaded hips and valleys, stepped chimneystacks with corbelled caps and decorative terracotta pots, and deep overhanging eaves supported by heavy Italianate cornicing with coin frieze, dentil course and modillioned brackets. Ogee cast-iron rainwater goods run throughout. The walls are painted smooth render with stucco detailing.

The ground floor displays heavy rusticated quoins, while the first floor has feather-edged quoins. A moulded string course runs between the floors. Windows are timber sashes, now boarded over—1/1 lights to ground floor and 6/6 lights to first floor. Those at ground level have moulded architraves and dripstones on scrolled console brackets. First-floor windows are segmental-headed with lugged keyblock architraves, except where later insertions occur. Sill courses and panelled aprons feature on principal elevations.

The principal south elevation is symmetrical (aside from a later window insertion) and centres on a projecting balconied porch. This porch has Corinthian columns in antis with banded rusticated antae, each supported on pedestals, with a plain entablature and decorative punctured stone parapet to the balcony. Ground-floor windows flank the porch on either side. The first floor contains a central triple round-headed arcaded window opening with French doors to the centre, flanked by single windows; a smaller segmental-headed window is inserted to the left.

The north and south elevations are identical, each with five equally spaced openings per floor. The exposed basement, enclosed by a steep bank, has plain reveals to its openings.

The west wing is asymmetrical, comprising a three-storey block fronted by a slightly lower two-bay block with more restrained detailing—simple moulded cornice and sill course at each floor. The south elevation of this front block features a bowed left bay with three windows at each storey. The right bay is fronted by a heavy porch canopy with curved corners and decorative parapet, supported by Corinthian columns on pedestals linked by a decorative painted sandstone balustrade. The central section is open and contains three square-headed windows separated by pilasters with apron mouldings; a bell push to the right of the central window suggests this was formerly a door opening. The balcony is accessed by a pair of round-headed openings. The right cheek of the front block has a door opening and plainly detailed segmental-headed window at ground floor, with a moulded-architrave window to the first floor. The main body of the wing features a curved corbelled-out southwest corner, partial dentil cornice, and plainly detailed windows at each floor, each with painted projecting sills.

The rear north range has a pitched slate roof with red clay roll-top ridge tiles, painted rendered walls, and uPVC replacement windows.

The setting within Whiteabbey Hospital grounds has been substantially altered. The original landscaped layout is mostly lost, with the house now surrounded by car parks and hospital buildings of various dates and styles. Vestiges of landscaping remain to the east. A former coach house to the west, now used as offices, retains some of the original detailing. A former multi-bay outbuilding range lies parallel to the north extension, similarly detailed with extended raking cornice forming a broken bed pediment to gable ends, a modern door opening contained within a double elliptical-headed carriage arch with painted rendered blocked surround, and uPVC windows throughout. This outbuilding also has a natural slate roof.