Belfast Roof Truss Shed, Gilford Castle Estate, 5 Banbridge Road, Gilford, Co Down, BT63 6DJ

Belfast Roof Truss Shed, Gilford Castle Estate

A single-storey shed built in the early twentieth century, forming part of the estate structures of Gilford Castle demesne. It is of particular interest for its innovative Belfast roof truss construction and as a late example of this structural type, contributing to the group of buildings that demonstrate the operation of a country house estate in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The shed is located on the Gilford Castle estate, south of the main house and immediately south of the kennels. It measures approximately 18.5 metres by 12.7 metres. The structure features a bowed roof covered with corrugated metal sheeting, constructed over five Belfast trusses of the McTear type. The walls are of brick laid in Garden Wall bond.

The east elevation is divided into six bays by full-height brick piers with offsets. All bays are lit at high level by squat timber windows with vestiges of inward-opening bottom-hung casements. The second bay from the right contains a door opening with a brick lintel and a timber double-leaf half-door. The south elevation is largely concealed by vegetation but contains two windows detailed as those on the east. The west elevation, also concealed by vegetation, is revealed by internal inspection to have a series of high-level windows. The north gable contains a timber-sheeted door to the left side and is otherwise concealed by the kennels building. The shed is accessed via the rear saw yard entered through a gateway to the east.

The building is first shown on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1901–2. A plan in a valuer's notebook of 1917 records the building measuring 28 feet by 44 feet by 13 feet, built of brick with a wood and felt roof. It is possible the shed was constructed as part of improvements made to the estate by Katherine Carleton, who purchased Gilford Castle in the opening years of the twentieth century. Other agricultural buildings were added to the estate in 1904. By the 1930s, the roof material had been changed to asbestos.

The Belfast truss was developed in Ireland as a wide-span, shallow-rise roof truss for industrial structures. McTear & Co of Belfast began fabricating these trusses in wood around 1866. By 1899, spans of 24 metres had been achieved, and in the twentieth century, shipyards and aeroplane hangars demanded ever-greater clear spans.

The shed is set in close proximity to other estate-related structures including a saw mill, kennels, and stableyard. It is concealed and surrounded by woodland and vegetation to the south and west.