117 Shankill Road, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT13 1FD

117 Shankill Road is a two-bay, three-storey polychrome brick building, corner-sited at the junction of Shankill Road and Craven Street in Belfast. It was built around 1900 as a pawn shop to designs by Herbert Thompson Sykes, and remodelled in 1937 as a bank to designs by Samuel Stevenson & Sons. It is currently in use as a community centre, occupied by Shankill Women's Centre. Although much of its original character survives externally in the decorative brickwork and stonework, the interior has been completely renewed with accompanying loss of historic fabric and detail.

The building is rectangular on plan, with a modern two-storey red-brick extension to the rear of no architectural interest. The roof is pitched natural slate with blue-black angled ridge tiles and a red-brick chimneystack with a moulded cap. The turret — a defining feature at the southeast corner — has a copper-clad roof with a pointed finial; the original extravagant ogee dome that formerly crowned it has been removed and replaced. There is a terracotta cresting and finial to the wall-head dormer window at the east, and plastic rainwater goods sit on a decorated red-brick Lombardic frieze.

The walling is stretcher-bonded red brick with yellow-brick and sandstone dressings. The ground floor is clad in grey granite on a black granite plinth. A moulded yellow-brick string-course runs between the upper floors, with an eaves band to the turret. Sandstone dressings include a dentilled cornice to the south gable. A floriated string-course sits above the Lombardic frieze to the south, with terracotta detailing to the south gable and turret.

All windows throughout are replacement uPVC, set in plain brick reveals. First-floor windows have flush concrete sills; the second-floor windows to the south have a yellow-brick continuous sill course. The principal window is Venetian in style, with a moulded sandstone archivolt over the central opening, exaggerated keyblocks, red-brick pilasters with carved console brackets, and a sandstone scrolled apron panel beneath. The south-facing gabled front is framed at upper floors by brick pilasters with moulded, dentilled, or carved heads. The turret to the right rises from a corbelled base over the entrance at the southeast corner and contains three second-floor windows and two narrow first-floor window openings. The original double-leaf five-panelled timber doors to the ground floor are retained, set in a polished granite reveal.

The west elevation is abutted by an adjoining building. The north elevation is largely obscured by the modern two-storey red-brick extension, with two windows and a uPVC door visible at second-floor level. The east elevation features a wall-head dormer with a brick-corbelled base at the left, a window at second-floor centre, and four irregularly arranged windows at first floor. At ground floor there are five replacement windows fronted by modern metal railings.

The building sits on a corner plot to the north side of Shankill Road. Directly opposite is the Albert Hall. To the west is an adjoining refurbished three-storey commercial block; to the east, on the opposite side of Craven Street, is a large four-storey modern apartment block. To the rear the building has been fully refurbished, with the two-storey red-brick extension topped by a roof terrace enclosed by modern metal railings.

The site at the corner of Shankill Road and Craven Street was occupied by Hugh Scott, pawnbroker, from at least 1878 according to street directories. After Scott's retirement and death — he died on 22nd March 1917 — the building was taken over and demolished by Joseph Davison, also a pawnbroker, who constructed the present building as a pawn shop and family residence. He named it the Tower Loan Office. The Belfast Revaluation of 1900 records the new building as costing £700, including shop fitting and shelving for the pawn office, with a valuation set at £83. The building first appears on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1901. The contractor was James Kidd of Leadbetter Street.

The architect, Herbert Thompson Sykes, was a former partner of W J W Roome. The only other major known work attributed to him is the Methodist church in Whitehead.

Joseph Davison is recorded in the 1901 census as resident in the building with his wife and two-year-old son. The seven-room house was designated first class. Davison was of Scottish descent, his ancestors having settled in Glenavy in the early 18th century where they farmed for generations. As a young man he was apprenticed to a Belfast pawnbroker, William McClure, before setting up his own business. In addition to the Shankill Road premises, he ran a further pawn shop on the Crumlin Road. By 1908 he had moved from the Shankill Road to a house in Glandore Avenue. His wife, Minnie Corken, had run a millinery business on the Shankill Road and was noted for her own business acumen.

Drawn to politics and seeking to oppose what he saw as socialist tendencies within Belfast Borough Council, Davison became a councillor for the Court Ward in 1911. By 1921 he was High Sheriff of Belfast and was knighted by King George V during the visit to Belfast to open the Northern Ireland parliament. In 1935 Sir Joseph was elected to the Senate, serving as Deputy Speaker from 1936 to 1937, as a member of the Privy Council from 1940, and as Deputy Leader of the Senate from 1941. He had a strong lifelong association with the Orange Order, becoming County Grand Master of Belfast in 1920 and Imperial Grand Master of the Orange Institution in the late 1930s, holding both positions until his death in 1948. The couple's two sons died as young men, and Sir Joseph is said to have placed orange lilies on their graves every 12th July.

By 1929 Davison had vacated the Shankill premises. Subsequent attempts to let the building met with little success, and it was used temporarily as a drapers, a furniture store, and a fish and chip shop. In 1936 the building was purchased for £1,500 by the Belfast Savings Bank, which remodelled it to their specifications at a cost of £3,034, reopening it as a bank in June 1937. At ground floor the interior was clad in marble; hardwood and terrazzo flooring was laid, central heating installed, and a strong room fitted to the rear. The manager lived on the premises above the bank, accessed by a separate side door in Craven Street. The first-floor accommodation comprised two sitting rooms, a kitchen, scullery, coal shed, stores, and a flat roof used as a yard; the second floor contained three bedrooms, a bathroom, and a WC. Following the remodelling the building was revalued at £160. A photograph of the newly opened bank, reproduced in Alf McCreary's history of Trustee Savings Banks in Northern Ireland, confirms that subsequent changes have included the removal of the ogee dome from the turret, the enlargement of the ground-floor window facing Shankill Road, the removal of some chimneys, the replacement of windows, and the addition of decorative grilles. In form and detailing, however, the building is otherwise as remodelled by the Savings Bank.

The first savings bank in the north of Ireland opened at Smithfield, Belfast, in 1816, as part of an early 19th-century movement across the British Isles aimed at encouraging the labouring classes to save, described at the time as an encouragement to sobriety, industry, and economy. A further office opened in King Street in 1829, and branches began opening in earnest in the following century: Mountpottinger was first in 1900, with the Shankill Road following in 1924, initially at number 120 opposite the present site. The Shankill Road branch was not unaffected by the Troubles: there was a serious assault and robbery in 1971 and an attempted hold-up in 1975. On 21st November 1974 savings banks across the province merged to form the Trustee Savings Bank of Northern Ireland. TSB Northern Ireland underwent a further merger with Allied Irish Bank in 1991 to form First Trust. The Shankill Road branch subsequently closed and the building was taken over as Shankill Women's Centre.