48-50 High Street, Comber, Co. Down, BT23 5HL

48-50 High Street, Comber

A small single-storey vernacular house, originally built as two separate properties and dating from before 1834, probably from the 1790s or slightly later. The building stands at the south-west end of a terrace on the south-east side of High Street, which rises on a slope from north-east to south-west. The two properties were amalgamated internally in 1986 during sympathetic renovation and restoration of the entire terrace.

The north-west front façade features a doorway to the left with a timber-sheeted and glazed door and plain fanlight. To the right are two sash windows with horizontal glazing bars (2 panes over 2), set at slightly differing levels due to the sloping site. A further doorway to the far right, formerly serving No. 50, now has a dummy door matching the first. The south-west gable is blank, with a relatively high parapet suggesting another property once stood adjacent. A small single-storey gabled return projects to the right at the rear, with a doorway on its south-west face similar to the front door and a relatively small double sash window to the right. The other faces of the return are blank. On the main rear façade to the left of the return stand two small sash windows, the right-hand one very small indeed. The entire façade is finished in roughcast and painted. The gabled roof and return roof are covered in natural slate. A single rendered chimney stack serves the building, and aluminium rainwater goods are present.

The site appears on the 1722 map of Comber. Both original houses were probably among the "seven houses exempt" (below rateable value) noted at this end of High Street in the 1834 valuation. The terrace is believed to have once housed workers from the nearby brewery (later the Upper Distillery) and may have been purpose-built for that purpose. In 1920 the terrace was acquired by Andrews flax spinning mill for employee housing. In 1980 it was vested in the Housing Executive, and in 1984 was acquired by Hearth Housing Association, with renovation and restoration completed in 1986. It is noted that High Street was known as Cow Lane during the 18th and early 19th centuries.