207 Belmont Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim, BT4 2AG

207 Belmont Road is one of a matched pair of semi-detached houses, built in 1870, forming a group with its attached neighbour at 209 Belmont Road. The house is three bays wide and two storeys tall over a basement, with a double pile roof. It sits on the south side of Belmont Road in the townland of Strandtown, set back behind a low brick wall with hedging and a cast-iron pedestrian gate to the front garden. A pair of large timber vehicular gates marks the western boundary.

The principal elevation faces north. Walls are constructed in red brick laid in Flemish bond, with smooth rendered finishes to the canted bay windows that flank the entrance. A continuous painted cill course runs at both ground and first floor levels. The wall below this cill course and down to basement level is finished in smooth render with a slightly projecting band at floor level. The canted bays have shallow lead-covered hipped roofs behind moulded ogee parapets.

The double pile roof is covered in natural slate with black terracotta ridge tiles to the main ridge. The return roof is also natural slate with lead-covered ridges. Eaves to the gable overhang and expose purlin detail. Red brick chimneystacks with three-band corbelling are positioned at the gable end of each pile and centrally on the ridge, all fitted with modern clay pots. Cast iron rainwater goods serve the main elevation, with ogee-shaped gutters supported on paired console brackets; half-round uPVC gutters on a timber fascia serve the rear.

On the first floor, the principal elevation has a pair of windows with segmental arched heads and lower sashes opening outward at the eastern end, a single window centrally over the door, and a further matching pair at the western end. At ground floor level, square-headed window openings sit to each side of the canted bays, which are placed either side of the central entrance door. The basement has a single square-headed window to the front face of each bay. All windows are uPVC replacements.

The central entrance door is at ground floor level, accessed by an inclined ramp with handrails spanning the open area beneath. The door opening has a moulded arched surround in smooth render, a plain arched fanlight above, and a painted timber door with circular panel detail. A door to the basement sits directly beneath the main entrance.

The east elevation is attached to 209 Belmont Road. The south elevation has smooth rendered walls with a centrally placed return that has a hipped slate roof with lead ridges, sitting at a slightly lower level than the main roof. Windows on this elevation are square-headed uPVC throughout. The west elevation has red brick and smooth render as elsewhere, with two uPVC windows at first floor level, both with segmental arched heads.

The house was built on land owned by Sir Thomas McClure of Belmont House, who held much of the land in the townland of Strandtown. By the time the Annual Revisions recorded the property in 1870, each house in the pair was valued at £46. The architect is not known. No. 207 was originally named Marlborough House. Its first recorded occupant was John Trueman, a commission and insurance agent with business premises on King Street, who lived there until 1881. He was followed by William Pyper, principal of Belmont Academy, who vacated the property before 1901. The 1901 census recorded John Harper Shaw, a chemist, as occupant, and described the house as a first-class dwelling of 13 rooms with a stable and coach house as outbuildings. Shaw died in 1916, after which his widow Catherine remained until the 1920s. From 1928 the house was occupied by W. G. Johnston, a local builder, whose family continued to reside there until at least the 1970s. The First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57) recorded the house as owned by Robert and James Pierce, local building contractors, and noted that it neighboured a petrol filling station (since demolished and replaced by Kingsley Court), with its value increased to £90. The Second Revaluation increased the combined value of the house, filling station, and stores to £322, by the end of which a Mr S. Johnston, an engineer, was recorded as resident.

The 1954 Ordnance Survey map records that a rear outbuilding originally associated with the property has been demolished. A photograph published in Aidan Campbell's Belmont shows that No. 207 also once had an ornate timber porch to its side gable; this had been removed by at least 1954, as it does not appear on the Ordnance Survey map of that date.

The wider area of Strandtown remained predominantly rural in character as late as the mid-19th century, as recorded by the second edition Ordnance Survey maps of 1858. Development of the area began from the 1860s with the construction of mansions for Belfast's prominent politicians and merchants, followed by terraced rows of houses, so that by the early 20th century the upper part of Belmont Road had become one of Belfast's most affluent residential areas, home to the city's merchant and professional classes. The third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1902 depicted 207 and 209 Belmont Road in their current layouts and noted that few neighbouring buildings had yet been constructed alongside the pair, although Belmont Primary School had been built to the east of the houses between 1889 and 1892.