Sydenham Primary School, Strandburn Street, Belfast, Co Down, BT4 1LX

Sydenham Primary School is a Modern Style single-storey primary school built in 1950 to designs by R.S. Wilshire, Belfast Corporation's Education architect. Located at the north-east end of Strandburn Street in Sydenham, it holds significance as the first completely new school built in Northern Ireland following the Second World War.

The school was constructed largely from prefabricated aluminium units, an innovative system devised by the Bristol Aeroplane Company of Weston-Super-Mare and licensed to the Belfast firm Short Brothers and Harland Ltd. This approach emerged from the post-war shortage of traditional building materials, putting the accumulated wartime skills and manufacturing capacity of both aircraft firms to essential peacetime use. Short Brothers manufactured and erected the superstructure in 73 days, with the assembly hall built by sub-contractors T & J Whiteside. The school came into use in August 1950 and was officially opened in May 1951.

In plan, the school is roughly asymmetrical, resembling the letter 'P'. It consists of a quadrangle of classrooms and offices with an assembly hall, and a projecting wing to the south-east. The quadrangle is constructed from corrugated aluminium units, largely painted, with extensive aluminium-framed glazing interspersed with projecting angled piers or struts that support the roof overhang. The east and west wings are classroom blocks with shallow pitched felted gabled roofs. Photographic evidence suggests the roofs were originally aluminium panelled. The narrower corridor wing on the north side has a flat roof and was originally open on its inner south-facing side but is now fully enclosed. The west wing has a lower flat-roofed corridor projection to its west side, with a small boiler room extension in brick added in the 1990s. The main entrance is set to the left of the east façade of the east wing, comprising a largely glazed timber double door with a projecting hood.

The south wing, containing largely offices and toilets, is slightly lower and narrower than the classroom blocks. It extends east beyond the quadrangle to form the projecting south-east corridor wing. This wing maintains the same aluminium construction but was extended around 2001 in brick to its north side. The brick extension comprises two distinct sections: the taller western section has a mono-pitched felted roof, whilst the eastern section features an unusual raised butterfly roof and serves as a covered play area. At its east end, the projecting wing abuts a smaller classroom block similar to the others. The assembly hall at the south-east corner of the quadrangle is distinctly different, built in brick and significantly taller than other sections. It features extensive glazing to its east façade and a shallow pitched felted gabled roof with brick parapets. A large water tank projects from its north-west corner. The hall links to the taller section of the brick extension at its south-east corner.

The building is largely intact, with rainwater goods a mixture of PVC and metal. An enclosed garden lies within the quadrangle, with a large tarmac-covered schoolyard to the east and south-east. A separate dining hall block, built in 1959 to designs by Donald Shanks, stands to the north-east of the main complex. This is largely single-storey, constructed in concrete brick and render with steel-framed windows. Its felt-covered roof is partly flat and partly butterfly-shaped, with the latter rising higher to form a clerestorey section. A small two-storey boiler house portion is located at the west end.