2 Lorelei, Bangor, Co Down, BT20 3TF

A three-storey two-bay Victorian mid-terrace house built circa 1898 on the outskirts of Bangor town centre, designed by architects Young and Mackenzie. The building is situated in an elevated position on the east side of Princetown Road, overlooking Bangor Bay, and is accessed via a lane between 82 and 88 Princetown Road.

The house began as part of a pair of semi-detached houses erected circa 1880 (which became numbers 3 and 4 Lorelei Terrace). In 1897, these were purchased by Samuel Crosbie, who developed the site further by adding four additional houses, two on either side of the original pair. The Irish Builder announced in August 1898 that two blocks of houses would be commenced at Lourlie for Mr Samuel Crosbie from plans by Messrs Young and Mackenzie, architects, Belfast.

Architecturally, the building has a rectangular plan with a pitched natural slate roof featuring a conical roof and finial over the bay. The walling is painted smooth render and stucco with a moulded string-course between floors and continuous sills; dentilled eaves are present to the second floor. A rectangular painted masonry chimneystack with moulded plinth rises above the roof line. The principal north-east elevation comprises a three-storey bow window to the left; to the right is the entrance with a single opening to the upper floors. The door is timber-panelled with a plain fanlight in a moulded recess, flanked by Doric pilasters surmounted by a bead-moulded arch with keyblock. Moulded swirl motifs decorate the spandrels. Some good architectural detailing survives in the main elevation. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods sit on projecting eaves, with plastic rainwater goods to the rear.

Windows throughout are uPVC replacements; the original windows have been lost. The south-east and north-west elevations are abutted by adjoining buildings. A full-height modern extension of the 1990s dominates the south-west (rear) elevation and is completely abutted to it.

The setting has been compromised by the addition of a tarmacadam car-park to the front and rear, with garages at the front at lower level. Modern steel railing extends along the front.

The terrace was built during Bangor's transformation from a declining manufacturing town to a thriving seaside resort following the arrival of the railway from Holywood in 1865. The first recorded occupier was Ernst A Boas in 1900, whose valuation was £36. The 1901 census records Ernst Boas as a linen manufacturer of the Jewish Farsi faith, resident with his Unitarian wife, three young children, a cook, and a nursemaid. Ernst was the son of Herman Boas (1827–1917), a founding member of the Jewish congregation in Belfast in 1861 and formerly resident at number 3 Lorelei Terrace. Herman Boas had emigrated from Lubeck to Nottingham in 1854 and settled in Belfast in 1861, trading as Sol Boas and Company, manufacturers of fancy boxes and linen ornaments. His wife Caroline Spiers was niece to the lexicographer Alexander Spiers and aunt to Herman Heyermans, the Dutch playwright and novelist. Herman's eldest son, Frederick Samuel Boas (1862–1955), became a distinguished Shakespearean scholar and Professor of English Literature at Queen's College, Belfast from 1901 to 1905.

By 1911, the character of the terrace had begun to change from large family residences to boarding houses. The 1911 census shows Sarah Stronge occupying both this house and its neighbour, number 3, operating them as boarding houses with two servants. Later occupiers included Robert G Martin (1922), Reverend John N Spence (1924), and Reverend Benjamin Brooke Moreton (1927), the latter two being ministers in the Hamilton Road Methodist Church, for whom the house served as a manse.

The building's original character has been compromised by conversion to modern apartments and loss of the original plan form; it is now a façade retention. Taken as a whole, the terrace is of relatively late date and common type and no longer meets the statutory and policy tests as a building of special architectural or historic interest. It was delisted on 3 February 2012.