Outbuildings at Edenderry House, 133 Ballylesson Road, Edenderry, Belfast, County Antrim, BT8 8JU

Outbuildings at Edenderry House

A single-storey gardeners cottage with abutting L-shaped outbuildings to the rear, built around 1734 as part of the estate workers' accommodation for the principal dwelling at Edenderry House. The buildings were erected as a unified design creating a partially enclosed courtyard and retain their original scale and proportions, though their condition has deteriorated. They remain in agricultural and storage use and have group value with the main house.

The cottage is rectangular in plan, four bays wide, with rough-cast render over rubble masonry and brick courses. It has a pitched natural slate roof with clay ridge tiles, and smooth render chimneystacks with octagonal clay pots rising to cornice caps. Windows are timber sliding sash, three-over-six panes. Two chimneystacks rise from the roof—one at the gable apex and one on the ridge line to the left of the front door. The left gable has a clipped verge and no openings.

The principal elevation faces north and is asymmetrically arranged. The front entrance is located left of centre, flanked by sash windows. To the right is a secondary access marked by a seam line in the masonry, comprising a square-headed door with an adjoining two-over-two sash window. The rear elevation is blank. The right elevation is a lean-to gable end adjoining the outbuilding, with a centrally located timber casement window in poor repair; the remains of a wall project from the right side of the gable.

Windows to the outbuildings are timber round-headed openings with fanlights incorporated into the upper sash featuring interlacing tracery; the lower sashes are infilled and rendered. Stone cills remain in their original positions although detached. Doors have round heads with fixed fanlights over, matching interlacing tracery and timber sheeted construction.

The abutting outbuildings comprise two adjoining rectangular structures arranged in an L-shape. The central block faces east onto the forecourt with a square-headed modern opening flanked by altered round-headed windows. Its rear elevation is built from earlier handmade bricks laid in Flemish bond with header corbel courses at eaves level; various openings of differing styles and sizes are in poor repair. The southern block faces south overlooking the rural landscape, with its gable end to the left featuring a door right of centre and a centrally located opening above. Its rear elevation displays exposed low-level rubble masonry with English garden-wall bond brick courses above, with various openings all in poor repair. The roofs are pitched natural slate with one pitch of the outbuildings partially covered by corrugated translucent plastic sheeting. uPVC rainwater goods are throughout.

Historical development evidence from the 1834 Ordnance Survey map shows the footprint of the outbuildings much as they appear today, though field evidence suggests the southern block was erected later or at least remodelled, indicated by the use of later brick types. The central block, with its earlier handmade bricks, forms the upper courses of a stone wall which may once have formed part of a walled garden, according to the present owner.

The buildings were commissioned by James Beers around 1734 as part of the principal house's outbuildings and workers' accommodation. Beers and James Watson Hull served as Church Wardens for the building of the new Drumbo Parish Church, to which Beers donated land free of charge. Beers, who gave instruction to be buried in the grave walk with no mark remaining over him, bequeathed the estate to his nephew Charles Dunlop around 1805. The last known resident in the cottage was Robert Waterworth, who became gardener around the 1920s until 1949, after which the cottage has remained vacant.

The buildings are situated at the end of a long driveway from Ballylesson Road, adjacent to the principal dwelling. On approach is a modern dwelling on the left prior to reaching the courtyard. To the north of the site is woodland rising to a hill crest. The surrounding land comprises largely open fields bordered by vegetation, all forming part of the estate. A small private burial ground adjoins the cottage in the forecourt, enclosed by fine cast iron railings. The spire of neighbouring Drumbo Parish Church is visible to the east.