82 North Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim, BT5 5NL

No. 82 North Road, originally known as Maryville, is a detached, symmetrical, three-bay, two-storey Classical-revival villa built between 1879 and 1880, most likely to designs by Young and Mackenzie. It stands on the corner of North Road and the Upper Newtownards Road in the townland of Ballyhackamore, East Belfast, set within its own mature grounds. The extent of the listing covers the house, outbuilding and walling.

Architectural Overview

The main house is constructed of coursed random rubble sandstone with red sandstone dressings, and carries a hipped natural slate roof with clipped gables to the north and south. The projecting eaves have a painted bargeboard fascia and soffit, and half-rounded cast-iron guttering discharges to circular downpipes. A pair of rebuilt buff brick chimneys with concrete coping and terracotta pots sit centrally on the ridge. Square-headed openings throughout have smooth ashlar red sandstone surrounds and sandstone sills. Windows are one-over-one timber sliding sash with horns, unless otherwise noted.

The formal symmetry of the house is most clearly expressed on the three-bay east-facing front elevation. This features single-storey projecting square bays flanking the main entrance, built in ashlar red sandstone with a coursed rock-faced plinth, stone sill, header, projecting sandstone cornice, and leaded flat roof. The coursed rubble rock-faced sandstone walling has quoins with tooled margins. The principal entrance is framed by a Greek-style red sandstone portico with a pair of Corinthian columns supporting a sandstone entablature with projecting cornice and leaded flat roof. The square-headed door opening is reached by a stone step and fitted with a timber panelled entrance door with a fanlight over.

Extensions and Alterations

The house has been extended on several sides. There is a two-storey gabled extension to the west, a further two-storey, two-bay gabled extension to the north-west, and a two-storey canted bay abutting the south-west. A mono-pitch, single-storey extension advances to the ground floor on the west side.

The north-west extension was added in 1895 at a cost of £1,000 and is recorded by a date stone carved "AD 1895" on its chimney stack, which has sandstone dressings. The gabled south elevation of this extension has a red sandstone course at first-floor header level and two ground-floor window openings with top-hung casement windows in toothed brick surrounds. The advancing rubble coursed sandstone chimney breast leads to a stack with skews and projecting coping. Around some later window openings at the rear, the red sandstone dressings have been substituted with red brick.

The south elevation is three-bay two-storey with an advancing pier to the west corner and a single-storey stone wall set perpendicular to enclose the yard to the rear. The side elevation of the hipped-roof two-storey canted bay has ground- and first-floor openings. The west-facing extension has a projecting two-storey single-bay entrance at ground floor with a brick surround and timber panelled entrance door. The west elevation shows the two-storey canted bay to the south bay of the main house, openings to the ground and first floors of the gabled west extension, and openings to the first floor of the north-west extension. The north elevation has ground- and first-floor openings to both the main house and the west extension, and a clipped gable to the north-west extension with ground- and first-floor openings.

A conservatory that formerly stood on the south elevation has since been removed; all that remains is the stone wall to the west side, now capped with a sandstone coping.

Setting and Outbuildings

The house is set back from the Upper Newtownards Road, separated from it by formal gardens with mature trees and an extensive lawn. Site boundaries to both street frontages are defined by hedging. Entrance gateways to the north-east and south-east consist of pairs of square-plan rock-faced pillars with pyramidal copings, and the driveway and parking area are surfaced in yellow gravel chippings. Lawns extend to the north, west, and east, with formal hedge boundaries to the east and mature tree planting to the north and west.

To the south-west stands a one-and-a-half storey outbuilding, and a further single-bay gable-front outbuilding is set parallel to the main house. A painted wall to the west, predominantly stone with brick coursing evident towards the top and capped by a rounded terracotta coping, is punctuated by two segmental-arched door openings: one to the south end leading to a single-storey monopitched outhouse, and another further north leading to the garden. Together with the south-west outbuilding, this wall and a metal gateway to the south enclose a rear courtyard.

Historical Context

In the mid-19th century the townland of Ballyhackamore was predominantly rural, occupied by only a small number of gentlemen's manors including Bloomfield House and Greenville House. By the 1870s the industrial expansion of Belfast, coupled with the development of the Belfast and County Down Railway, had led to the creation of new streets and housing in the area. No. 82 North Road was constructed for the Bloomfield Land and Building Company Limited, formed in 1874 by the landowning Boyd family to secure leases for building projects in the East Belfast townlands of Ballyhackamore and Ballycloghan.

The house is attributed to Young and Mackenzie, described by the Dictionary of Irish Architects as the most successful architectural practice in Belfast, the leading architects for the Presbyterian Church in the North East, who also received some of the most important commercial commissions in the city. The firm was involved in a number of contracts in the Bloomfield area between 1877 and 1880, including four villas designed in 1877 — believed to be the neighbouring numbers 2–6 Cyprus Avenue and No. 99 Upper Newtownards Road — and a terrace of cottages on the Beersbridge Road for the Bloomfield Land and Building Company Limited (nos. 364–374 Beersbridge Road). The design of No. 82 North Road is considered similar in style and proportion to these Beersbridge Road buildings, and the same sandstone was used in the masonry of all these structures.

Upon completion in 1880 the property was given a total rateable value of £42. It was originally known as Maryville and leased initially to a Mr William Bryars, who vacated it around 1887. In that year James Fitchie, a local stationer and paper merchant, took up occupation and continued to reside there until his death in 1932. The 1901 census described Maryville as a first-class dwelling of 12 rooms, possessing a stable, cow house, and fowl house. Following the 1895 north-west extension, the total rateable value of the property rose to £67. By the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57) the value had risen further to £90, and ownership had passed to a Mr James L. Clarke. The house was also used as a private medical surgery by the 1950s, occupied by a Dr E. Bolton until at least the 1970s. By the end of the Second General Revaluation (1956–72) the rateable value stood at £86.

The house was listed in 1987. General repairs carried out around 1993 included the restoration of the decorative sandstone pillars and scrolls at the front entrance and bay windows. A further renovation in 2011 included the repointing of external stonework, repair of the roof, and replacement of damaged rainwater goods.