38-40 Shore Road, Portaferry, Co Down, BT22 1JZ

38–40 Shore Road, Portaferry, County Down

These are two relatively large, three-storey former terraced houses — now combined and used as Portaferry Sailing Club — located on the east side of Shore Road, to the south of Portaferry town centre, with their front façades facing south-west and overlooking Strangford Lough. No. 40 also served as a Masonic Hall. Both buildings almost certainly originated as houses dating from around 1790 to 1830, possibly present on this site by 1838, but were given their current late Victorian and Edwardian appearance through a remodelling carried out around 1890 to 1900. Early 20th-century photographs confirm that both previously had Georgian façades. The site appears on Patrick O'Hare's 1799 map of Portaferry as being in the possession of either Widow Nielson or Thomas Waugh, and valuation records of around 1835 to 1838 record at least two three-storey dwellings on this general site. It is considered highly unlikely, though not impossible, that the earlier buildings were demolished around 1890 to 1900 and the present structures built from scratch in their place. The buildings are listed together for their group value, and sit within a conservation area. The main entrance to the Sailing Club is at No. 38; the bar is on the ground floor and the restaurant on the first floor, both extending into the first bay of No. 40.

No. 40 — the former Masonic Hall

No. 40 is the more elaborate of the two buildings. Its front façade is generally symmetrical and finished entirely in plain render with chamfered quoins at the right-hand corner. The central doorway has a timber panelled double door framed by pilasters with detailed floral decoration. Above the door are decorated brackets, a keystone and an entablature, all below a cornice hood with a miniature balcony and ball finials. A modern precast decorative block has replaced an earlier guilloche design in this position. To either side of the door are sliding sash and case windows with a cill course and wrought-iron decorative guards. At first-floor level there are three similar windows, each with decorated wooden hoods (pelmets) and a cill course. The second-floor windows are similar to those on the first floor but slightly shorter, with a dentilled cill course that incorporates an ogee gutter. These upper windows are set within gabled half-dormers with moulded verges and ball finials. All windows across the façade are arranged within three arched recesses that extend down to ground-floor level, with intermediate elliptical arch heads broken by central and shouldered smaller elliptical arches at the half-dormer windows. The central arrangement has no intermediate arch. Between the gabled dormers, and between the second-floor gutter in the cill course, there are three square cast-iron downspouts discharging from ogee gutters, with similar spouts continuing from the cill course to ground level. There are stone parapets and two yellow brick chimney stacks with simple corbelling and uniform pots.

An unusual, almost centrally positioned chamfered dormer with a hipped Bangor blue slate roof is set behind the second half-dormer gable. This upper dormer has small sliding sash windows to each of its sides and rises above the ridge of the main roof, finishing with a gabled chimney — set side-on — to the rear elevation. The main roof is gabled and covered in Bangor blue slates.

To the rear of No. 40 is a large two-storey gabled return containing the former Masonic hall, covered in Bangor blue slates, with a substantial chimney stack centred on the rear wall. The upper portion of the main rear façade is rendered, with evidence of a former window opening to the left near the eaves. To the right there is a gabled half-dormer.

No. 38

No. 38 is a simpler attached building. Its front door is a single panelled door framed by pilasters with floral-decorated brackets and an entablature. There is one one-over-one sash window to the right of the door at ground-floor level, two at first-floor level, and two at second-floor level, the upper windows set within gabled half-dormers with moulded verges and ball finials. There is evidence of a blocked-up archway between the two houses, now rendered over, which was most likely an access passage to a coach house to the rear.

Interior

Following internal inspection, it has been confirmed that Nos. 38 and 40 are fully integrated. Both buildings retain much historic fabric and detailing, particularly to their front elevations.

Setting and grounds

The buildings occupy a fine position within the terrace on Shore Road, directly overlooking Strangford Lough. To the rear there is an extensive raised garden with an historic boundary wall, the remains of a possible coach house, and — according to the Sailing Club's representative — a water tank beneath the garden, though this is not visible.