Stormont Presbyterian Church, 618 Upper Newtownards Road, Belfast, BT4 3HH

Stormont Presbyterian Church is a gabled, double-height church in the Romanesque style, built in 1954–55 to designs by Belfast-based architect Thomas T. Houston (1917–1978) and constructed by local firm James Buckley & Sons. It stands on a prominent corner site within its own grounds at the junction of Upper Newtownards Road and Castlehill Road, Belfast.

The church is of cruciform plan, with a square-plan tower to the south-west and a two-storey flat-roofed porch to the south-east. The roof is pitched natural slate with raised verges to the gables, parapets with moulded concrete coping, and ogee metal guttering discharging to circular and rectangular section downpipes. Walling is laid in rock-faced artificial stone on a moulded plinth, with smooth-faced dressings to cill and banding at impost levels. Window openings are round-arched with smooth banded surrounds and splayed cills, fitted with fixed timber casement windows unless noted otherwise.

The principal elevation faces south and comprises three elements: a square-plan three-stage tower to the west, a recessed double-height gable at the centre, and the square-plan two-storey flat-roofed porch to the east. The tower has a round-arched door opening with a deep moulded surround, a plain spandrel, and a double-leaf square-headed timber sheeted door opening onto two nosed steps. The second stage features five-part round-arched windows with smooth banded surrounds, and the belfry stage has three-part round-arched louvred openings on all four elevations below projecting bracketed eaves and a pyramidal roof. A square-headed door opening to the east face of the tower has a timber sheeted door with glazing, opening onto a ramp. The central gable has seven round-arched windows at ground floor level, of which four are fixed timber casements and three contain stained glass, with a rose window with stained leaded glazing at high level. The eastern porch has a round-arched door opening set within a shallow projecting door surround, with a recessed doorcase having a panelled spandrel and a double-leaf square-headed timber sheeted door opening onto two nosed steps.

The east elevation shows the two-storey porch to the south end, a three-bay nave, the projecting gabled east transept, and a single-storey bay to the north. The porch has three-part round-arched windows at first floor level, three-part round-arched windows with fixed timber casements at ground floor level facing north, and a tall window above. The nave has three tall windows, and the gabled transept has three windows, the central one taller than the others.

The north gabled elevation is abutted by a two-storey flat-roofed extension.

The west elevation comprises the west face of the three-stage tower to the south, abutted by a small single-storey flat-roofed outshot, a three-bay nave, the projecting gabled west transept, and a single bay immediately to the north. This elevation is abutted to the north by a two-storey gabled modern extension. The tower has three-part round-arched windows with smooth banded surrounds at first stage and three-part round-arched louvred openings at belfry stage. The nave has three tall windows, and the gabled transept has three windows, taller to the centre. The next bay has a round-arched door opening to a narrow projection with a panelled spandrel and a double-leaf square-headed timber sheeted door. This bay is partly modernised with a narrow two-storey glazed metal-framed extension.

Inside the church, the stone font with figured reliefs was sculpted by Rosamond Praeger (1867–1954), an Irish artist, writer and sculptor from County Down, who also created the statue of "Johnny the Jig" in Holywood and carvings at St Anne's Cathedral in Belfast.

The church was designed deliberately to reflect the character and detail of the adjacent double-height, gabled, pitched-roof hall to the east, which dates from 1931 and was itself designed by Thomas J. Houston (1873–1938), the father of the church's architect. The church historian Larmour described the building as "plain Romanesque in reconstructed stone" and noted that a Byzantinesque dome was designed for the tower but was never carried out. The foundation stone was laid in January 1954 by Lord MacDermott, and the completed church was opened on 18th September 1955, having cost a total of £60,000. The new church could accommodate a congregation of 730, in addition to the 300 the hall could hold. An Upper Hall to the rear of the church was added in 1962 at a cost of £10,000.

The church hall itself has considerable historical significance as the first project undertaken by the General Assembly's Church Extension Committee following the partition of Ireland. The site at the corner of Castlehill Road and Upper Newtownards Road was acquired in 1921, as Stormont grew out of a Belfast Presbytery plan of that year to establish a new congregation in the area. The hall, comprising a meeting hall, classrooms and a kitchen, was opened on 1st September 1931 and was always intended as the first phase of a wider building scheme, with land set aside to the west for a future church. By the late 1930s the rapidly growing local population had outgrown the hall, and a decision to build a new church was made in 1939, though the scheme was postponed, presumably due to the outbreak of the Second World War, until the 1950s. Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57), the value of the church hall was assessed at £220; by the end of the Second Revaluation (1956–72), the combined value of the church and hall stood at £1,540.

The setting includes paved and tarmacked parking to the south and west, enclosed by coursed rock-faced cast stone dwarf walling. Plain metal gateways to the south and south-west are supported on square-section gate piers matching the walling, with pyramidal coping stones. A more recent gateway is located to the north-west. The church is abutted by a two-storey flat-roofed extension to the north and a single-storey flat-roofed extension to the east. Although the church is of interest, its setting has been compromised by numerous extensions and it is not considered to be of special architectural or historic merit sufficient for listing.