Shop ('Nova Tiles'), 167 University Street, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT7 1HR

A small single-storey terrace shop known as Nova Tiles, located on the south side of University Street near its junction with Ormeau Road in Belfast, dating from around 1930. The building has since been demolished.

The shop was rectangular in plan, measuring approximately 17.7 metres by 7.3 metres, and sat between two much taller earlier houses, now converted to offices. The north-facing front elevation was dominated by a full-width shop front, largely glazed with nine tall lights and incorporating a central glazed double door. Above this, the rendered façade rose into a stepped parapet of somewhat Art-Deco style, with plain coping. Just below parapet level was a recent laminated shop sign, with smaller roundel signs to either side displaying the street number, which may have been original features.

The building was distinguished by a Belfast Truss roof, a distinctive curved timber roof structure supported by bowstring girders. The curved roof was covered with corrugated metal and featured a central gabled rooflight with plain glazing. The Belfast Truss had been developed in the mid-nineteenth century to meet the demand for efficient, lightweight, long-span roofs brought about by the industrial revolution. The first known reference to such a structure appears in a Dublin Builder advertisement of 1866 by the Belfast felt-makers McTear & Co., who continued manufacturing trusses until 1908. Anderson & Co., a second Belfast felt supplier, began producing trusses to a slightly different design in 1886, launching their Mark II version in 1896, which became widely known as the Belfast truss design. This building represents a relatively rare and seemingly well-preserved example of a small Belfast Truss-roofed building of industrial archaeological interest. The property does not appear on the Ordnance Survey map of 1921, supporting the approximate dating to around 1930.