Elmgrove Primary School, Beersbridge Road, Belfast, County Antrim, BT5 4RS

Elmgrove Primary School is a two-storey red brick school complex built in Arts and Crafts style, dating from 1930 to 1933. It was designed by Reginald Sharman Wilshere (1888–1961), architect to the Belfast Corporation Education Committee, and is located on the south side of Beersbridge Road. It is an accomplished example of Wilshere's school designs and, upon completion, was the largest school the Committee had yet built. Wilshere, a Belfast-based English planner, was appointed to his role in 1926 and went on to design 26 new schools before the outbreak of the Second World War. The Irish Builder recorded his belief that children who lacked beauty in their daily surroundings needed it all the more in their schools, and his typical approach was to build large schools arranged around quadrangles with corridors open to the air. Paul Larmour has noted that Wilshere's schools at Elmgrove, Avoniel, and Nettlefield were the first modern schools to be built anywhere in Ireland.

The school was planned by the Belfast Education Committee, established under the 1923 Education Act, to accommodate 800 pupils and replace inadequate accommodation at St Donard's Church, Simpson's Memorial, and the former Beersbridge Road School. Shortly before its completion, the Belfast Newsletter observed that the building demonstrated "what can be achieved without the use of elaborate architectural detail," depending for its effect "solely on grouping, colour and proportion." Wilshere himself stated in 1932 that every one of his schools had "something distinctive about it architecturally, though all follow the same line in planning." At Elmgrove, the distinctive features noted at the time included the red clay tile roof with swept valleys — which required no lead flashings — and the inclusion of a sundial in one of the walls, both said to be unique among Wilshere's schools. Larmour also singles out the "very Danish looking stepped gable" as a further unique feature. The school was officially opened on 9 March 1933 and was originally divided into a senior school and a junior school, each containing ten classrooms.

The complex consists of two main building blocks arranged around quadrangles, linked by a gabled assembly hall. The quadrangles are organised as cloister garths: gardens or paved areas enclosed on three sides by single-storey flat-roofed corridors with round-arched, full storey-height timber windows having panelled lower sections and metal-framed casement openings to the centre. The north quadrangle is landscaped and used as a school garden; the south is concrete-paved and serves as a play area.

The roofs throughout are pitched red clay tile with swept valleys, angled red clay ridge tiles, and raised verges. Projecting eaves carry cast-iron half-round guttering and circular cast-iron downpipes with decorated hoppers and a semicircular clay tile detail above. The red brick walling is laid in stretcher bond in some areas and Flemish bond in others, with a projecting plinth course throughout. Window openings are generally square-headed with original timber casements, decorative red brick lintels, and painted sills unless otherwise noted.

The east elevation is the most architecturally elaborate. To the north it presents a two-storey, multiple-bay wing that is symmetrical with a gabled roof and hipped dormers built off the face of the wall to each of the ten bays. At the central bay stands a two-storey square-plan projecting gate tower with a raised parapet. This has a round-arched doorway with a red brick hood and splayed jambs, a square-headed door opening with a sheeted timber door leading onto a paved platform with steps and ramp, and a painted cast stone plaque above the arch. Original four-part paned timber casement windows with painted sills occupy the first floor, and single-paned timber casement windows face north and south. A projecting single-storey flat-roofed corridor with a parapet and glazed timber-framed double doors runs between the outshots and the entrance tower at ground floor level on each side, with clerestory windows to the main elevation behind the parapet.

The double-height gabled building at the centre of the east elevation has a projecting stepped-gabled entrance porch with a round-arched door opening, a moulded red brick hood, and splayed jambs. A replacement half-glazed timber door opens onto a single nosed step. A flat-roofed corridor links the projecting porch to the side wings, and carries round-arched, full storey-height timber windows with panelled lower sections and metal-framed casement openings to the centre. The one-and-a-half storey south wing has a round-arched doorway with a red brick hood and splayed jambs to the central bay, a square-headed sheeted timber door opening onto a platform with steps, and a projecting flat-roofed corridor with glazed doors and clerestory glazing matching the north wing. Each of the single-storey gabled outshots on the east elevation has a three-sided rectangular plan bay window with original paned timber casements.

The west elevation consists of a single-storey six-bay wing to the north, flanked by modern single-storey flat-roofed additions. At the centre is a double-height gabled building with a projecting single-storey three-sided canted bay, a single-storey flat-roofed outshot to its north side, and a modern two-storey wing to the south flanked by single-storey flat-roofed blocks. The north wing has a seven-part window to each bay with original timber casements. The south wing, which is of little architectural interest, has a two-storey central section of three bays and two single-storey bays to each side, with a projecting two-storey entrance porch, a raised parapet, a round-arched door opening to the central bay, and seven-part timber casement windows to each single-storey bay.

The north elevation has a three-bay building to the east, a three-sided double-height hipped-roof canted bay to the centre, and a modern single-storey flat-roofed building to the west, with square-headed window openings to each bay of the eastern section. The south elevation consists of a modern flat-roofed single-storey building to the west and two single-storey pitched-roof buildings of five and three bays to the east, with original timber casement windows to each bay.

Modern single-storey flat-roofed buildings have been added to the west corners of the two main blocks, and these compromise the school's architectural character to some degree. More significantly, the southeast wing — part of the original junior block — was destroyed by fire in 1976, demolished, and rebuilt in 1984 at a cost of £250,000; this replacement is of little architectural interest.

The site also includes the two-storey hipped-roof caretaker's house to the northwest, which was designed by Wilshere but not erected until 1936. It is listed separately and has group value with the school. According to J. A. K. Dean, the design of this porter's lodge was influenced by the work of Edwin Lutyens. Three modern single-storey flat-roofed buildings of little interest stand to the southeast. The grounds include concrete-paved playing areas to the rear and lush landscaping to the east and northeast. The site is enclosed to the north by a low brick wall topped by simple iron railings, with rectangular plan piers having plinths and corbelled copings supporting simple metal gates. To the south is tall fencing; to the west and southwest, a tall brick wall topped with fencing; and to the east, a hedge.

The school also has group value with other Wilshere-designed schools in Belfast. It was listed in 1994 and was refurbished and extended in 2008. It continues in use as a primary school.