17-21 Castle Place, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 1EL

Attached three-storey with attic red brick Victorian commercial building, built c.1867, to the designs of William Hastings with polished granite shopfront inserted to the ground floor c.1917 to the designs of W. Eccles. Irregular on plan with a three-storey brick return and facing south onto Castle Place. Mansard natural slate roof with roll-moulded clay ridge tiles and a single decorative profiled brick and rendered chimneystack to the raised east gable. Decorative pedimented dormer windows to the front pitch flanked by decorative finials having decorative tympanums and single-pane timber sash windows. Replacement steel box gutter and square-profile iron guttering to either end supported on sandstone eaves in turn supported on a series of decorative corbels to a full-span frieze punctuated by foliate blocks supported by scrolled console brackets. Red brick walling laid in Flemish bond. Deeply recessed window openings formed in gauged brick, segmental-headed to the second floor, round-headed to the first floor having bipartite timber casement windows with fixed-pane overlights. South front elevation is five windows wide with continuous hood mouldings rising from decorative foliate impost mouldings. Second floor windows have stepped heads and reveals over blind apron balustrades having interlacing carvings. First floor windows have stepped reveals, decorative keystones and polished granite balustrades flanked by squat piers resting on the shopfront cornice. Shopfront comprises three central square-headed window openings with replacement fixed-pane glazing flanked by Doric pilasters and having apron panels with decorative bronze sill guards. The pilasters support a full-span fascia and cornice with mutules. Square-headed door opening to the left with replacement aluminium glazed entrance screen having an architrave surround and surmounted by a pediment supported on concave console brackets. West side elevation abutted by adjoining infill building. Rear elevation abutted by three-storey red brick return. East side elevation abutted by adjoining infill building. Setting Located on the north side of Castle Place to the east of the junction of Donegall Place and Royal Avenue. Roof: Natural slate RWG: steel/cast-iron Walling: Red brick Windows: timber