Banford House, 56 Banbridge Road, Gilford, Craigavon, Co Down, BT63 6DJ

Banford House is a symmetrical three-bay, three-storey Georgian country house with semi-basement, built around 1780. It occupies an elevated site north of Tullylish settlement, overlooking the former bleachworks.

The main building has a rectangular plan with a full-height rear extension added around 1910. It is abutted on either side by conservatories dating from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The roof is hipped natural slate with angled ridge and hip tiles, and two rendered chimneystacks with multiple pots. The eaves feature a painted stone cornice with ogee cast iron rainwater goods. The walling is roughcast throughout, with sandstone quoins (the top quoin is reeded) and a platband separating the basement from the piano nobile.

Windows are generally timber sliding sash with simple horns, and some retain original crown glazing. Basement windows are 3/6 lights, those to the piano nobile and first floor are 6/6 lights, and second floor windows are 3/3 lights. Windows on the principal façade sit within moulded stone architraves with projecting sandstone sills, while basement and secondary elevation windows have slightly projecting rendered reveals.

The principal elevation faces south and is five windows wide over the semi-basement. The piano nobile features a central wide segmental arched entrance accessed by eight sweeping bull-nosed sandstone steps, enclosed on either side by ornate cast-iron balustrading. The doorcase is painted stone with Ionic pilasters on plinth blocks flanking Edwardian stained-and-leaded glass sidelights. The door itself is painted timber with seven panels and an Edwardian brass letterbox. Above is a large spiderweb fanlight and moulded archivolt. A Neoclassical frieze in Adam style, reeded to the centre with lion's head medallions and carved swags, decorates the space above.

The first floor has a central tripartite window (4/4, 6/6, 4/4 lights) with pilastered mullions, all set within a segmental arched sandstone surround with moulded keyblocked archivolt, plain tympanum, and foliated pilasters. The basement extends to the left, forming a room two windows wide.

The west elevation is abutted at piano nobile by an Edwardian timber conservatory with a leaded pavilion roof, partially supported over the basement on cast iron columns with decorative capitals to the left. Ground floor windows have been converted to internal access doors. Upper floors are lit by a window on either side of a central blind window, all with architraves. The basement has two windows to the left beneath the conservatory. The conservatory features overhanging sheeted eaves on profiled brackets, full multi-paned glazing retaining original glass over horizontally-sheeted timber plinth, and lattice-paned transom glazing. Double-leaf access doors to the west side are reached by a set of metal steps.

The rear elevation is abutted on the left by a full-height flat-roofed extension. The exposed right bay has a window to each floor, vertically aligned. The extension has irregular fenestration, including round-arched windows to the north and east, and is itself abutted by a glazed lean-to supported over basement coal-sheds to the west. Concrete steps lead to the basement channel at the right side, with timber doors to the right bay and extension.

The east elevation is three windows wide to the upper floors, extended by an extension at right and abutted by a conservatory (built around 1880) at left. Two windows to the piano nobile: the left is now converted to provide access to the conservatory, the right to a glazed timber door accessed by modern metal steps. This conservatory is timber framed over a rendered plinth, with arcaded round-arched glazing and an additional raised lantern to the glazed roof.

The house occupies a prominent elevated site with views over the surrounding countryside and Tullylish bleachworks to the south. The mature grounds include a gravel forecourt, with a former bleach green to the south enclosed by sweeping beech avenues to east and west. Lawn surrounds the sides and rear, bounded by mature trees and hedges. The former stableyard, now in separate ownership, has been redeveloped. Immediately to the north-east is a former walled kitchen garden with a round-arched timber sheeted entrance gate set within a rubble stone and brick folly tower. The site is accessed by modern electronic metal gates on modern cement-rendered banded piers with urns.