217 Holywood Road, Belfast, Co. Down, BT4 2DH

A detached three-bay two-storey building with dormer-attic, built around 1887 as a red brick former rectory. It is now used as offices for various youth organisations and is located on the eastern side of Holywood Road, Belfast.

The building has an irregular plan with full-height projecting gabled bays to the principal elevation facing west and to the eastern and southern elevations. A canted bay window projects from the south elevation, and a gable-fronted porch occupies the central bay of the principal elevation. The north elevation is abutted by a two-storey L-plan return, which adjoins single-storey red brick outbuildings to the northeast.

The pitched roof is covered mostly in natural slate with artificial asbestos-cement tiles to the rear eastern pitch, topped with angled terracotta ridge tiles. Multiple red brick chimneystacks with stepped brick coping and yellow clay pots rise from the roof. Gutters are uPVC, mounted on overhanging eaves, though some original cast-iron soil-pipes and downpipes with decorative brackets are retained. Corbelled brackets project to purlin ends at the gabled bays, concealed behind painted timber bargeboards. The walling is red brick laid in Flemish bond over an offset plinth, with various projecting brick string courses to the upper floors. Red sandstone dressings include flush lintels with segmental relieving arches formed in brick, projecting cills, and cinquefoil roundels with shield motifs to some gable apexes.

Windows are generally original 1/1 timber sashes with horns, some retaining historic glazing. A pointed-arched original fixed-pane timber window lights the porch. Ground floor windows are largely concealed behind externally mounted metal roller shutters or wire-mesh screens. Several first floor openings are paired.

The entrance porch has a basket-arched door opening on its north side with a red sandstone lintel over a raised-and-fielded nine-panelled timber door featuring a circular brass or bronze lions-headed handle.

The west principal elevation comprises a two-storey central bay with paired pointed-arched windows over the projecting porch, flanked by full-height gabled bays, the right-hand bay projecting further. A stepped sandstone string course extends from the central first floor window cill to that of the left bay. The porch is approached by a single step to a raised sandstone platform.

The north elevation contains a segmental-arched window to attic level and a diminutive timber casement to the right of the ground floor, with a splayed sandstone plinth extending below the cill. The two-storey L-plan return attached to this elevation is detailed as the main building with a blank north gable. Its right western cheek contains a single ground floor window with a cinquefoil roundel to the second floor. The left eastern cheek is two bays wide, with a single window to ground and first floors on the left and a half-gabled first floor window over a tripartite metal casement window concealed by wire mesh with replacement concrete surrounds on the right. The short axis of the return abuts the right side of the north elevation of the main building, with paired windows to the first floor (diminutive on the right cheek) and two ground floor windows. The north gable of the return is abutted by a single-storey gabled outbuilding with raised brick verges, artificial slate roof and sashes concealed by wire mesh. A matching outbuilding to the east forms an enclosed yard accessed via a timber-sheeted door in the north red brick perimeter wall.

The east elevation has a single bay to the left with a projecting gabled bay to the right, featuring paired windows to the first floor, a tripartite opening to the ground floor, and single openings to the left cheek, including a flat-arched French door concealed behind a metal roller shutter.

The south elevation is two bays wide, gabled to the right bay, with paired first floor windows over a canted bay window that has brick parapet and sandstone coping. Ground floor openings are concealed by metal roller shutters.

The building is located on Holywood Road between St Mark's Church to the north and the associated Heyn Memorial Hall to the south, close to the junction with Sydenham Avenue. It is set back from street level with a vehicular entrance to the north shared with the church and a pedestrian path to the south shared with the hall. The site is bounded to the west by a sandstone dwarf wall with chamfered coping topped by arrow-headed mild-steel railings with flower heads to standards having dog-leg supports. Rectangular plan ashlar sandstone piers with chamfered coping stand at regular intervals. Concrete paved hardstandings surround the perimeter, with bituminous macadam paving to the north and west. The site is surrounded by a garden with mature trees and planting to the western perimeter.