286 Tennent Street, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT13 3GG

286 Tennent Street, Belfast

An asymmetrical, two-bay, two-storey-with-attic terraced brick house constructed between 1907 and 1909, located on the west side of Tennent Street in the Shankill area of Belfast. The building faces east and is rectilinear on plan, with a projecting front gable to the first floor and attic level. A wall-head dormer window and bay windows are prominent features.

The principal elevation comprises Flemish bonded brick with decorative red tiles to the upper levels. The ground floor has two openings, with a white uPVC front door featuring a moulded brick, camber-arch surround surmounted by a rounded arch motif in black brick. A fully glazed bay window occupies the right side of the ground floor, set on a brick plinth. The projecting gable on the first and attic floors is supported by a timber beam and square timber posts at each corner, with rebuilt dwarf walls between terraces acting as plinths and masonry columns in ionic style providing secondary support. A wide central window with a small canopy lights the first floor, with a smaller attic window similarly canopied. Decorative tiling is horizontally aligned with sill and lintel of these window openings.

The pitched red tile roof features roll-moulded red clay ridge tiles and a wide brick chimney with heavy bands and double moulded detail on the principal face. A wall-head dormer with a pitched roof is topped by decorative timber barge boards, and a central modern skylight has been added to the rear roof. All windows throughout the building are uPVC with glazing bars to the main elevation; flat arch heads and offset painted brick sills are used elsewhere.

The rear of the building comprises a two-storey, gabled return with a single-storey lean-to structure (formerly the coal shed) positioned between the rear boundary wall and the gable of the return. The rear elevation is constructed in English Garden Wall bond with roughcast to the first floor. A single-storey rear wall extends west from the return, forming a boundary wall to an internal courtyard painted white. A timber sheeted and braced door provides access to the courtyard.

The building is situated in an urban setting between Crumlin and Shankill Roads. To the east, a small newly paved garden with a dwarf brick wall and cast-iron gate fronts the property along Tennent Street. To the rear, a long, narrow garden plot runs west to the boundary wall. A paved walkway extends along the rear of all properties in the terrace, though it has been sealed with locked gates to the south. The Crumlin Road Presbyterian Church is located north-east on the corner of Crumlin Road and Tennent Street. The immediate surroundings include a mixed-use business park and apartment complex to the west, built on the site of the former Edenderry Spinning Mill.