36 High Street, Donaghadee, Co. Down

36 High Street, Donaghadee

A fine, relatively large two-storey terraced house, probably built around 1870, situated on the north-east side of the south end of High Street. The house remains largely intact.

The front south-west facade features a right-of-centre doorway with incised pilasters and a matching Greek key pattern decorative frieze and cornice. The door itself is panelled, with glazed upper panels and a plain fanlight. To the right of the doorway is a plain sheeted timber door providing access to a narrow entry serving the rear. To the left are two sliding sash windows. The first floor contains three unevenly spaced sliding sash windows, each resting on a cill course with brackets and surmounted by a moulded course. The front facade is finished in lined render with chamfered quoins at ground floor level, a dentilled eaves course, and a chamfered plinth. The exposed section of the south-east gable is rendered.

The rear elevation shows a full-height gabled stairwell projection to the left of centre, featuring sliding sash windows at two landing levels. To the right of this projection, the main building rear face has sliding sash windows to both ground and first floors. The far right ground floor contains a single-storey gabled kitchen return with a partly glazed door and a large modern kitchen window to its south-east face. The left-hand side of the main rear face has a first-floor sliding sash window and a timber sheeted and glazed door with plain fanlight at ground level, providing access to the entry. The rear facade is finished in rough cast.

All roofs are gabled with Bangor blue slates, though the slates to the front of the main roof have a less refined 'Tullycavey' appearance. Rendered parapets are present, with dummy skylights (appearing to have no glass) to the front of the roof. Two rendered chimney stacks and cast iron rainwater goods complete the exterior.

Historical records show the site was occupied around 1780 according to the De la Cherois map, and appears on the 1834 and 1858-60 Ordnance Survey maps. A property on this site was valued at £5 in the valuation of circa 1836, suggesting it was probably two-storey. The present structure exhibits the appearance of having been built or completely renovated well into the latter half of the nineteenth century, possibly around 1870. The irregular arrangement of front facade openings might indicate reworking of an older house, though this is somewhat contradicted by the high-ceilinged interior, which has a distinctly late-Victorian character.