3 Station Square, Helen's Bay, Bangor, BT19 1TN

3 Station Square is a single-storey, two-bay former station master's house built around 1863 to designs by Charles Lanyon for the Belfast, Holywood & Bangor Railway. It is situated at the north-west corner of Station Square in Helen's Bay, aligned east-west with its principal elevation facing south towards the station.

The building is relatively utilitarian in design but reflects its railway background and was designed by a prominent architect. It forms part of an interesting group with the adjoining station building and related railway structures in the vicinity.

The pitched roof is covered in natural slate with eaves boards along exposed rafter tails and a scalloped bargeboard to the east gable. A rendered chimney with two octagonal stacks rises from the east gable. Ogee-profile steel gutters and circular metal down pipes serve the roof drainage. The walls are cement-rendered and painted, with vee-jointed stepped quoins. An advanced painted base course is applied to exposed elevations.

The south elevation is symmetrical, featuring a central porch with a sheeted timber door. The door has band rustication to its jambs and fixed leaded lights to its cheeks. The porch roof and walls are detailed to match the main block. Each flanking bay contains a square-headed opening with a 2/2 sliding sash window with stepped and vee-jointed jambs and a painted cill. The station yard abuts the left end of this elevation, with a hedge to the front.

The west gable is entirely abutted by a one-and-a-half-storey modern addition to the house. The north elevation is abutted by a separate modern house and contiguous tall blank wall. The east gable has a 2/2 sliding sash window in a plain square-headed opening, in front of which a timber trellis has been erected.

The building is located off Station Square in Helen's Bay, close to Clandeboye Avenue to the north of the listed railway station and station platforms, and east of the associated coach yard and railway bridge. To the north is the related road bridge.

The railway arrived in Holywood from Belfast in 1848, but the Belfast, Holywood & Bangor Railway Company did not begin construction of the Holywood-Bangor section until 1862. Due to land access difficulties and extensive rock blasting, it took three years to complete, opening on 19 May 1865. When it opened, the Belfast & County Down Railway Company sold its Belfast-Holywood section to the Belfast, Holywood & Bangor Railway Company. In 1873, the line was leased to the Belfast & County Down Railway and transferred outright in 1884. This station master's house was built around 1863-65, at the same time as the adjoining station. Unlike the station, it was of relatively plain design and was probably the work of Charles Lanyon, the Belfast, Holywood & Bangor Railway Company's consultant architect. When the adjoining station building was closed, the station master's house became surplus to requirements and is now privately owned.