Quarry House, 42 Quarry Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim, BT4 2NP

Quarry House is a well-proportioned two-storey, ten-bay, irregular-plan house built in 1912, designed in the Arts and Crafts style by the Belfast architectural partnership of Watt, Tulloch and Fitzsimmons. It sits in the townland of Ballymaghan on a large plot on the south side of Quarry Road, with vehicular entrances to the west and north, extensive terraced gardens to the south, and a separate two-storey garage to the east. The house retains its original character both externally and internally, and is of local importance for its architectural quality, historical associations, and the survival of its setting.

The house has a hipped natural slate roof with hipped gables to the south and north, rolled lead ridges and hips, and finials to the apex. Four tall two-stage roughcast rendered chimneystacks with simple cornices and terracotta pots rise from the roof. Flat-roofed dormers appear on the south and east elevations, and skylights are set into the south elevation. Deep overhanging eaves are carried on timber brackets with timber fascia, ogee gutters, and cast-iron rainwater pipes. The external walls are roughcast rendered throughout, with a smooth rendered string course at first-floor cill level.

The entrance elevation faces north and is composed of a single-storey roughcast rendered yard wall with tiled coping to the east, set back before the main two-storey body of the house. Square-headed window openings are fitted with 6-over-6 timber sliding sash windows with stone cills — three at ground floor and two at first floor on this section. The projecting staircase bay is a notable feature, with a tripartite window at ground floor level incorporating ornate circular coloured glass set in a stone surround, and a large square-headed timber-framed leaded light window divided into nine lights at landing level. To the west of the staircase bay is a projecting single-storey porch with a pitched natural slate roof, timber bargeboards with swept eaves, and a sandstone surround with a shouldered detail to the entrance opening, including a timber open-work tympanum. Shallow steps lead up to small angled wing walls with sandstone coping. Internally, the porch has roughcast rendered walls, a square-headed panelled and beaded timber door, and a square-headed window opening with a sandstone cill to the west elevation.

The east elevation repeats the single-storey yard wall treatment of the north elevation and includes a square-headed window and door opening. The door is a timber sheeted stable-style half door, and the window is a 6-over-6 timber sliding sash. A small flat-roofed bay with a 6-over-6 sliding sash window abuts the blank wall of the north elevation at first-floor level, with one further 6-over-6 sash window to its north. A flat-roofed dormer with a 3-over-3 sliding sash window adjoins a chimneystack, which has a tiled gablet to its east. One small square-headed window appears in the main wall at ground floor level.

The south elevation is divided into four distinct sections. At the west end, a flat-roofed dormer with lead cheeks contains two timber casement windows. Moving east, one section has one window at ground floor and two at first floor, irregularly placed. The next section steps forward and features a large square-headed door and window screen with small square panes to the overlight, a pair of timber and glazed doors with glazed sidelights, and two windows at first-floor level. Further west again, a projecting section includes a timber and glazed bay window at ground floor with a tripartite arrangement — a larger 6-over-9 timber sliding sash window flanked by 4-over-6 sashes on either side — and a corresponding tripartite arrangement above with a 6-over-6 sash to the centre and 4-over-4 sashes to either side. The far western section of the south elevation accommodates a single-storey garden room with a hipped natural slate roof, deep overhanging eaves on timber brackets, modern multiple-paned timber windows running the full width, top-hung opening lights, and paired timber glazed doors to the centre. The lower sections of the mullions here are decorated with recessed panels topped with small capitals.

The west elevation shows the single-storey garden room to the south with modern multiple-paned windows. To the south at ground floor is a single-storey canted bay with a parapet roof, containing one square-headed window with a 6-over-6 sash under a straight running mould. To the north at ground floor is a single-storey curved semi-circular bay with a hipped natural slate roof, timber brackets to the soffit, and three square-headed windows with 6-over-6 sashes. Two 6-over-6 sash windows appear at first-floor level on this elevation.

The boundary to the north consists of low roughcast rendered walls with deep copings and regularly spaced piers with pyramidal caps, topped with cast metal railings finished with arrow-heads. A curved gate screen to the east has circular piers with conical caps and a pair of modern metal gates. The boundary wall curves around to the western entrance, where matching circular piers with conical caps frame a further pair of modern metal gates. The site is bounded by mature hedges to the east, south, and west.

The house was built as a wedding present by Frank Workman — of Workman, Clark and Co. Ltd., Belfast's second largest shipbuilder — for his daughter Florence on the occasion of her marriage to Cecil Lindsay in around 1911. Cecil Lindsay was a linen merchant in the family firm of Lindsay Brothers Ltd., linen and woollen merchants, who operated from 7–9 Donegall Place. Notably, Frank Workman himself never lived at Quarry House, residing instead at The Moat from 1910. The house was designed by Watt, Tulloch and Fitzsimmons, a partnership formed in 1909 between Robert Graeme Watt, Frederick H. Tulloch, and Nicholas Fitzsimons — the same firm had designed Lindsay Brothers' business premises at 7–9 Donegall Place in 1910.

Cecil and Florence Lindsay lived at Quarry House, which was valued at £100, until around 1917, when Cecil's brother David — also a partner in Lindsay Brothers Ltd. — took possession. Cecil and Florence Lindsay later moved to Lissue House in Lisburn, where Cecil died in 1946. After Watt's retirement or death in 1915, the firm continued as Tulloch and Fitzsimmons, and David C. Lindsay engaged them to carry out a series of additions to the house. These included a bedroom over the car house to the east, the canted bay on the west elevation, and the projecting bay to the first floor of the south elevation. These alterations raised the rateable value to £110.

Despite serious financial difficulties following the Wall Street Crash of 1929 — which led to the announcement of the closure of the Workman, Clark shipyard in 1930 (the yard finally closed in 1935) — the Workman family retained ownership of Quarry House until at least the 1970s. The house was auctioned on 24 January 1930, organised by David C. Lindsay on behalf of the Workman family. The auction particulars described the property as containing an oak-panelled hall, a good dining room and double drawing room, six principal bedrooms, three servants' bedrooms, a boxroom, three bathrooms, a cloakroom, extensive culinary apartments, a wash house, and all necessary conveniences. After the auction, the house was occupied by Marcus A. Mitchell, a director in a Belfast-based company, who continued to lease it from the Workman family until his death in 1949. The First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57) raised the value to £134. By 1959 the house was occupied by a Mr A. T. Hardy, who continued to reside there until at least 1972, by which point the value had risen to £140. The house continues in use as a private dwelling.