56-60 North Street and 2-10 Lower Garfield Street, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 1FP

56-60 North Street and 2-10 Lower Garfield Street, Belfast

A two-storey-with-attic red brick building in the Queen Anne Revivalist style, designed by the architects Graeme Watt & Tulloch and constructed around 1896. The building is roughly L-shaped in plan, with a curving long axis along Lower Garfield Street and a gabled return fronting North Street. It was built in conjunction with Nos. 12-14 Lower Garfield Street, forming a group of commercial buildings with shops across the ground floor and public halls above. Most of these spaces are now vacant and derelict, with the exception of No. 8.

The roofline is particularly prominent, featuring gabled attics, wall head dormers, belfries and multiple chimneys. The roof is steeply pitched with slate tiles and terracotta ridge-tiles. There are five red brick chimneys, largely corbelled, and a pair of octagonal louvred and lead-domed belfries positioned on the ridge-line. A parapet extends above the eaves on the principal elevations, excluding the rear. The rainwater goods are generally aluminium ogee (with some uPVC) mounted on a moulded projecting stone eaves course, or on plain timber fascia to the overhanging eaves of the rear.

The walling is red brick laid in Flemish bond with an irregular series of gables and chimneys on the wallhead, unified by a heavy cornice. Windows are generally boarded up, but those remaining are 1/1 segmental-headed timber sashes with projecting stone sills. The first floor windows, now blocked, are tall and narrow, set in moulded stucco architraves lugged at the base with scrolled keystones, and a continuous linking cill course. Other windows have plain surrounds with projecting stone sills containing 1/1 timber sashes. The ground floor shops sit below a heavy moulded stone cornice and entablature, supported on panelled pilasters that separate each unit. Plain brick pilasters rise from corbels at first floor window head level, extending through the cornice to the parapet and dividing the multiple gables and chimneys. All ground floor units are completely boarded up except for No. 8.

The principal elevation faces east along North Street, with a chamfered corner at the far right along Lower Garfield Street. This corner features a single window at first floor with a curved balustrade in front, and the ground floor entrance door is blocked. The remaining elevation is asymmetrical, with five first floor windows and a brick gable above on the left side, which contains two windows.

The rear elevation is generally convex, with the ground floor obscured by a single-storey brick boundary wall. The gabled bay at the far right return advances as a blank gable, with its left cheek being one opening wide and abutting the main building. The central proportion contains irregular flat-arched windows at first and second floor levels (the first floor window is blocked), while the far left portion has three tall and narrow round-headed windows at first floor, extending through to the second floor, with corresponding attic dormers above. The west elevation is abutted by the adjoining section of terrace (HB26/50/322B).

The north elevation is asymmetrical. The far left bay contains a tripartite blind arcade or arch at first floor with a shop unit below and a matching gable to the north street elevation at attic level. The remaining elevation is asymmetrical with five openings wide on the first floor, each generally having a corresponding shop unit below (all blocked). The fourth window from the right contains the former entrance to the upper floor halls, marked by a scrolled and broken pediment above the now blocked and modified doorway. As with the North Street elevation, large iron ventilation grilles are set in the wall below each window.

The ground floor shop of No. 8 retains some features of interest: modern timber sheeting with a large window to the left, a vinyl sign above, and an externally mounted roller shutter. A chamfered entrance bay to the right features original decorative floor tiles, with a panelled timber and glazed door providing access to the shop porch. Above No. 8, the remains of a cast iron decorative lamp (possibly for gas) survives.

The building addresses the eastern end of Lower Garfield Street with a concave curve, extending for a short distance along North Street. It constitutes an important element of the townscape in an area that has lost many historic buildings in recent decades, with its roofscape visible from considerable distances. The building relates contextually to the Deer's Head on the opposite side of Lower Garfield Street and to the North Street Arcade, located a short distance to the north-east. Lower Garfield Street is pedestrianised, and a single-storey brick wall bounds the perimeter to the rear of the building, which addresses a large open area used for car parking.