The Gate Lodge, 554 Antrim Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim, BT15 5GJ

The Gate Lodge, built around 1870, is a detached asymmetrical Gothic Revival gate lodge designed by John Lanyon as the principal entrance lodge to Belfast Castle. It sits on the east side of Antrim Road in Belfast.

The building is constructed of random coursed rock-faced sandstone ashlar with moulded trim detailing. It is two storeys tall with two bays on its principal east elevation, where a steeply pitched gable rises to the right above a projecting semi-circular bay window to the left. The bay window is topped with a conical natural slate roof, lead flashing, and a decorative wrought-iron finial. Crow-stepped gables with ball finials terminate both the main gable and the flanking walls. An ashlar sandstone chimneystack, cruciform in plan, rises at an angle from the south corner of the principal east gable.

Window openings feature stop-chamfered bowtell mouldings, splayed flush sills, and timber sash windows with historic glass. The first floor contains paired single-pane timber sash windows with ogee horns; the ground floor has 2/2 timber sash windows (curved to the bay window) with steel security grilles. All are surrounded by ashlar sandstone dressing. A decoratively carved dressed sandstone plaque with a heraldic shield and monogram is centred on the principal gable.

The roofs comprise steeply pitched natural slate of varying heights, with terracotta crested ridge tiles and lead valleys set behind the crow-stepped gables. Original nail-head cast-iron guttering is supported on a moulded sandstone ashlar eaves course with cast-iron box downpipes. A flush sandstone ashlar string course and beak moulding run between ground and first floor levels.

The south elevation features a gable to the right and a recessed corner entrance portico to the left, open to south and west. The portico is supported by a squat sandstone circular column rising from a square plinth block with moulded base to a stiff leaf capital. The portico openings have shouldered smooth sandstone ashlar arches with bowtell moulded heads and recessed corbels. A single window opens to the west within the portico; a shouldered door opening to the south features an original diagonally sheeted timber door with iron furniture. This door opens onto a black and terracotta clay tiled area. A square carved sandstone plaque with a heraldic shield is set into the gable above.

The west elevation comprises two gables, with the smaller gable over the entrance portico carrying an uncarved square plaque.

A single-storey flat-roofed sandstone extension projects to the north with crenellations above the parapet where it meets the east gable. This extension contains a single door and window opening with concrete lintels over both. The north elevation is blank and abutted by this extension.

To the east, the main elevation extends southwards as a decorative sandstone screen wall or rampart featuring a crow-stepped gable above a voussoired round-arched pedestrian entrance with a hood moulding with foliate label stops and replacement steel gate. Above this gate sits a diminutive crow-stepped gable surmounted by a ball finial. An original stone-paved section fronts the east elevation. An early twentieth-century steel gate to the south provides vehicular access to a bitumac paved parking area occupying much of the site's western side.