1 Ean Hill, Holywood, Co. Down

1 Ean Hill, Holywood

A one-and-a-half-storey three-bay former parochial house, built in 1873–1874 and located to the south of Holywood town centre. The building is rectangular on plan with a projecting porch and a two-storey return to the rear; a second-storey castellated tower rises from the centre, giving the otherwise simple structure a distinctive and quirky character.

The pitched natural slate roof features terracotta ridge tiles pierced with trefoil detail and finials to the gables. Decorative fascia and bargeboards ornament the eaves. Rectangular smooth render chimneystacks with chamfered plinth (suggesting individual flues) are topped with three tall clay terracotta pots. Modern skylights light the roof of the main block, and a glass cupola sits on the rear return. Cast-iron half-round rainwater goods are mounted on drive-in brackets. The walling throughout is ruled-and-lined smooth render.

Windows are replacement timber sliding sashes (4/4 panes, double glazed) with horns set in camber-headed arch surrounds with projecting masonry sills. The principal elevation faces east and is four windows wide with a central gabled porch featuring a replacement timber-sheeted door. The south gable contains a square-headed tripartite window with mullions, the central pane taller than those flanking. The west elevation, abutted by the return and flush with the north gable, has a square-headed tripartite window with mullions (central window taller); the left cheek has two diminutive first-floor windows and a modern timber ground-floor door, whilst the right cheek has a single window opening. The north elevation comprises 2/2 camber windows to both floors. The castellated tower features Irish crenellations, a bracketed frieze, and paired 1/1 round-headed timber windows on all sides.

The building was erected in 1873–1874 by Reverend James O'Laverty, then parish priest of Holywood, as a Catholic school called St Laiseran's Academy. As O'Laverty later wrote, the school was built for "the education of boys and girls whose parents did not wish them to commingle at the National School with children of a humbler class". The introduction of tramcars to Belfast caused many Belfast merchants resident in Holywood to relocate to other suburbs, reducing school attendance significantly. After considerable financial loss, O'Laverty closed the Academy after only a few years and converted the building into a parochial residence in 1877. The house first appears in valuation records in 1877, when O'Laverty is recorded as the occupier, holding the property from the Trustees of the Roman Catholic chapel, valued at £20. It is possible that the porch was added as part of the remodelling for residential use, as the first valuation map does not show it.

Reverend James O'Laverty was born in Lecale and educated at St Malachy's College, Belfast and Maynooth, where he was ordained in 1851. He served as parish priest in Holywood for over thirty years and was the driving force behind the building of St Columcille's church. O'Laverty was a historian of considerable repute, contributing articles to the Ulster Journal of Archaeology and producing a five-volume history of the Diocese of Down and Connor. He helped initiate harp-making in Belfast and advocated their introduction in National Schools. The tower of the building served as his personal observatory, which he used to pursue his hobby of astronomy.

The house was vacated when a new presbytery was built in the church grounds. It remained largely unused until it was completely renovated in 2002, when it was converted to office use. The modernisation programme involved a comprehensive remodelling of the interior, which saved the building from dereliction.

The building is situated in a largely residential area to the south of Holywood High Street, with St Comcille's church directly to the south and 19th-century red-brick terrace housing to the north. A tarmacadam car park to the south is accessed via modern rubble-stone gate piers with castellated tops and is bounded to the road by a rubble-stone wall. The front is enclosed by a paved pathway and hedgerow, with a modern timber fence to the south and west.