2 Station Road, Sydenham, Belfast, BT4 1RE

A late Victorian Arts and Crafts house built around 1883–1885 at Sydenham, Belfast. It was constructed together with the adjacent No. 4 Station Road as part of the outbuildings for 'The Den', a villa that stood to the west. The Den was built for Gustav Wilhelm Wolff, a businessman and Conservative MP for East Belfast from 1892, one of the founders of Harland and Wolff shipbuilding and engineering company in 1862. Though this historical association exists, the building has been substantially altered since Wolff's time and does not directly reveal these connections.

The house is a long rectangular structure with gable ends and a slated roof punctuated by two brick chimneys. A single-storey modern extension sits at the south-east end. A central gable marks the south side, while the main entrance, sheltered by a modest lean-to canopy, is positioned at the centre of the north side.

The building adopts the pseudo-half-timber aesthetic typical of the Arts and Crafts period. A striking feature is a band of black-painted oversailing brickwork running around the building approximately 1½ feet below the eaves, intended to represent a jetty. Above this band, the walls are articulated by evenly spaced parallel timber studs set about 30 centimetres apart. Below the brick band, the side walls lack studs except on the front or south-east side, where a series of widely spaced vertical, horizontal and angular studs breaks the wall plane.

All three gables carry a horizontal collar beam. The end gables also feature tie beams. The west end gable displays attractively curved wooden braces pierced by windows, with visible timber pegs characteristic of genuine timber framing, though the tie beam has been broken by the enlargement of a window. The east end gable comprises a grid of wooden studs, also pierced by windows.

Windows throughout the building feature coloured glass—blue, red and yellow panes—dating from the late twentieth century. The west end gable includes a single-storey canted bay with a front window of 30 panes and side windows of 12 panes each, with the top level consisting of top-hung casements. Above, a T-shaped window arrangement features a central window of 18 panes flanked by 9-pane windows.

Along the long southern elevation, windows are set within rendered narrow surrounds painted black and have cambered heads. They vary in size—one with 18 panes, one with 8, and another with 24—all top-hung casements one pane deep and incorporating coloured glass. The north elevation contains no window west of the door. East of the door is a high cambered-headed window of four panes, followed by a cambered-headed window of 18 panes with the top three as part of a top-hung casement. The later kitchen window has 36 panes with top-hung casements and a mullion. Both this window and the adjacent cambered-headed house window are fitted with wooden shutters pierced with playing card symbols—diamond, club, heart and spade.

The entrance is accessed through a four-panel doorway with a high-placed four-pane flanking window of cambered head, both sheltered by a small lean-to roof supported on carved wooden posts. The nogging is modern white-painted render.

The building may be the work of Belfast architect James A. Hanna, suggested particularly by the T-plan of the window on the first floor of the north gable and the use of angular Tudor-shaped arches. The interior was significantly changed in the late twentieth century. The Den itself was built on the site of a pre-1858 residence known first as Mary's Cottage and later as Chester Cottage, purchased by Wolff from the Reverend James Speers in 1873. This building appears to have served as the housekeeper's house for The Den.