2 Clanbrassil Terrace, Clanbrassil Road, Cultra, Co. Down, BT18 0AR

A large three-bay three-storey-over-basement terraced house, built around 1860, located on the south shores of Belfast Lough to the east of Holywood. The house is rectangular on plan with a pitched natural slate roof and brick chimney featuring a moulded rendered plinth, multiple flues and terracotta pots. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods sit on sandstone dentilled eaves. The walling is ruled and lined render over sandstone.

Windows are 2/2 horizontal timber-framed sliding sash with horns (1/2 to second floor) set in moulded reveals, with reveals to the principal elevation in deep relief. Continuous sills run to ground and first floor, while the basement and top floor have projecting sills. Sandstone surrounds with keyblock details (absent from basement windows) frame the openings; the principal elevation has exposed sandstone whilst the rear elevation has painted render surrounds.

The principal (north-facing) elevation has been modified to accommodate a basement level entrance door. To the right is a canted bay with four openings extending from basement to first floor, whilst the second floor is five openings wide. To its left are three openings on ground and first floor, with the basement containing two small windows to the left of a modern half-panelled timber door. A smooth rendered plat-band separates the ground and first floors. The east elevation is abutted by the adjoining building.

The rear elevation now contains the main entrance and is symmetrically arranged with three openings to each floor. A central projecting porch at ground floor is accessed by four sandstone steps with squared and diamond terracotta tiles to the top step. The porch has a four-panelled timber door with bolection moulded-and-raised panels and a transom light, set into a moulded surround with keyblock and moulded stringcourse at springing level. A moulded cornice and dentilled eaves top the porch, which is further topped by two terracotta urns on a plinth. Steps down to the basement to the left pass through a cast-iron gate and railings. To the right is a replacement timber Dutch door abutted by a uPVC glazed porch with a hipped roof on the projection and lead flashing. To the left is a timber-framed 1/1 sash window. The basement to the east has a single window opening and a half-panelled timber door under the porch to the west.

Access to the rear is through curved entrance walls formed by round rendered stone piers with projecting pointed caps on corbels. The property is bound to the road to the south by a rubble stone wall with brick and stone coping. Gravel car-parking to the south and a large lawn to the north are separated from the beach by a rubble stone wall and steel three-bar railing.

The house has been modernised in recent years with the north elevation altered to include an entrance to a basement apartment, resulting in significant loss of interior detailing, although the internal ground-plan has largely been retained. Reception room ceilings display expert stuccowork by William Hayes of Marino. The bathrooms originally boasted showers, bidets and comprehensive toilet facilities. The basement provided full culinary capacity with wine cellars and housekeepers' rooms.

The terrace does not appear on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1858 but is listed in the Annual Revisions of 1870 as 'Clanbrassil Terrace', the name taken from Henry Hamilton, Earl of Clanbrassil, a local proprietor. The terrace was conceived as four houses, each with yard and pleasure ground with buildings, initially valued at £50. According to local historian Con Auld, entrepreneurs George McAuliffe and James Connor commissioned cartographer J Phillips to draw a pictorial map of houses and building sites to be let along the coast shortly after the arrival of the Belfast and Bangor Railway Company at Marino and Cultra stations. Clanbrassil Terrace was depicted as having five houses, with those at the ends built at right angles to the central block. The house at the west end was destroyed by fire in 1878. The proposed house at the east end was not completed, with protruding building stones indicating the intended additional residence. The developers reserved a site for stables and outbuildings nearby. A double banked earth terrace was designed to rise from the sea-bordered lawns to conceal the basement windows, with tennis courts and a pitch and putt course spreading before the entrance front, and a driveway designed to surround the completed terrace.

Valuation records show the house falling to £42 by 1877, perhaps as the result of an appeal. By 1885, the valuation fieldbook notes that the first house in the terrace, adjoining number 1, is in ruins and has burnt down. In 1887 the current house fell in value to £35 possibly as a result. By 1880 the occupier was John L Vallely but by 1887 it was vacant. Many changes of occupier in subsequent years indicate the house was let. In 1900 the occupier was William F Copeland. The valuation fell to £25 in 1910. In the 1930s the house was occupied by John Parker, a news editor and sports commentator, and leased from Kennedy, initially valued at £25 then raised to £35 and lowered to £34 on appeal.

The terrace first appears captioned 'Princess Gardens' on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1900-02 but after 1933 the name changed to Clanbrassil Terrace. On the Ordnance Survey map of 1938-41, it is captioned 'Clanbrassil Terrace'.

The house forms part of a distinctive terrace that as a whole is a good example of the type of large and prosperous suburban residence developed in the late nineteenth century as the suburbs of Belfast expanded and the railway arrived. A modern end-terrace house to the south may be said to complete that part of the original terrace but presently makes it asymmetrical.