42 Upper English Street, Armagh, County Armagh, BT61 7BA

An attached three-storey late eighteenth-century former town-house, now converted to commercial and office use, standing on Upper English Street in Armagh conservation area. The building has an irregular skewed plan form with a shop occupying the ground floor.

The roof is covered in artificial slate with replacement gutters and cast-iron downpipes supported on cavetto stone eaves. A replacement redbrick chimneystack is shared with the adjoining building. The front elevation is rendered in roughcast cement over painted smooth render at ground floor level, while the gable is roughcast throughout. The rear elevation displays a variety of materials: exposed Flemish bonded brick to the upper floor, random sandstone rubble to the first floor, and recently executed cement-based roughcast render to the ground floor.

The windows vary considerably. Those to the upper floors at the front are generally replacement one-over-one horned sashes with painted masonry cills. Original multi-paned timber sashes without horns are present to the gable, featuring smooth rendered architraves. Rear windows are typically replacement plain sashes with concrete cills, though one original six-over-six sash survives with exposed box frame, no horns or cill, and rubble sandstone voussoirs. The principal elevation faces north-east and is aligned with three windows on each floor, those to the left offset slightly. The south-east gable has a sash window centrally placed to the second floor and attic.

The ground floor entrance door is positioned to the left of the principal elevation, set within a deep panelled timber reveal and a tooled stone long-and-short keystoned surround, painted. The door itself is original six-panelled, accessed by two sandstone steps, with a hinged kickboard, brass knob and bronze knocker. A round-headed recess at ground level to the right of the door formerly housed a boot-scraper, now gone. Two additional rectangular recesses at the base of the panelled linings may have similarly accommodated boot-scrapers. The remainder of the ground floor is shopped, with a modern multi-paned timber display window and flush fascia beneath an additional projecting timber fascia. The shop door is covered by a roller shutter, and a steel grille protects the shop window. Ghost marks on the south-east gable indicate a former lower gabled abutment set to the right. The gable is also abutted by a classically styled rusticated ashlar stone arch with balustraded parapet, leading to the rear yard.

The rear elevation is abutted by a timber-sheeted cantilevered toilet extension accessed from the second half-landing and rising to beneath eaves level. The ground floor has been recently rendered with a timber-sheeted panel with glazed central section inset beneath the toilet extension. The abutments of the toilet extension were recently removed. First and second floor each have a window set to the left side. The west gable is abutted by the adjoining building, which is similarly proportioned.

A substantial yard lies to the rear, recently laid with tarmac and enclosed by boundary walls, recently rendered following removal of outbuildings. The building is prominently located in the urban setting of Armagh city centre, opposite the junction with College Street. Nearby are a listed nineteenth-century terrace to the west opposite, and the fine Italianate former bank, now St Patrick's Trian visitor centre, to the immediate east, joined to this building by an arch.