60-64 Wellington Place / 12-13 College Square East, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 6GF

Corner-sited, four-storey rendered former townhouse, built around 1830 as part of a late-Georgian terrace at the junction of Wellington Place and College Square East in central Belfast. The building was extensively renovated around 1983 and is currently in commercial use, with shops at ground-floor level and the upper floors vacant. Although compromised by modern alterations, much historic fabric and detailing survives. The building and its neighbours represent a rare surviving building type in the heart of the city — a Georgian terrace of a kind once common throughout central Belfast but now quite rare. Comparable examples include a four-storey terrace on Chichester Street and two three-storey terraces on Joy Street and Hamilton Street.

ARCHITECTURE

The building is L-shaped on plan, facing north onto Wellington Place and west onto College Square East. The roof is natural slate, hipped to the outer corner and finished with cement ridge tiles, spanning a two-pile plan to the north section and a single-pile plan to the west section. There are replacement profiled red brick chimneystacks with clay pots. The roofline is set behind a blocking course and eaves cornice. The external walls are finished in painted ruled-and-lined cement render with painted rusticated quoins to the outer corner.

Window openings are square-headed with concrete sills and replacement 6/6 timber sash windows. The four-storey west elevation is six windows wide. The north elevation is four windows wide. Both elevations have a replacement hardwood glazed shopfront spanning the ground floor, with a square-headed door opening to the central bay fitted with a replacement hardwood glazed entrance screen. The shopfront of the adjoining building to the south spans across two bays. The east side elevation abuts No. 58 Wellington Place, and the south side elevation abuts No. 14 College Square East. Rear elevations are cement rendered and largely obscured by later additions and adjoining structures, with largely uPVC windows and a replacement red brick profiled chimneystack rising from the rear.

The building originally had a red brick facade, now concealed beneath stucco render. Although much of the original facade has been altered, early chimney pots survive, some of the beaded or dropped bead type and some of the dragon's teeth type. A photograph of College Square North dating from around 1880 shows the terrace before its conversion to commercial use, when the ground floor of the row had ornate doorcases with fanlights above.

HISTORY

The terrace on Wellington Place and College Square East was constructed between 1822 and 1832–33. It does not appear on a map of Belfast included in George Benn's The History of the Town of Belfast, which recorded that the Royal Belfast Academical Institution marked the western limit of the town at that time and was still not surrounded by many buildings. Both the Wellington Place and College Square East terraces are, however, depicted on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1832–33. The terrace was originally intended as desirable residential accommodation for Belfast's professional classes, and College Square itself was laid out in the early 19th century with the same purpose in mind.

The Townland Valuation of Belfast, contemporary with the first edition Ordnance Survey map, recorded the corner building as a single property valued at £13 19s. 7d., occupied by a Miss Finley. The building appears to have been vacant in 1843, when no occupant was recorded in the Belfast Street Directory of that year. By 1852, a Mr Thomas Grattan, a dentist, had taken up occupancy — one of a great number of medical professionals to reside along the terrace during the 19th century. Grattan was still in residence at the time of Griffith's Valuation in 1860, which noted that the corner building, like the majority of the terrace, was leased from the representatives of the estate of a Mr James Blair, and that the property's value had risen to £34 since the 1830s. Grattan was still listed as occupant in 1868, but by 1877 had been replaced by the Lindsay Brothers. In 1880 the property was occupied by a Mr W. E. Mayne, who operated a Christian Tract depot, and on coming into possession the value of the corner building was increased to £40.

In 1892 the Annual Revisions record that the former private dwelling was converted into a hotel known as the Balmoral Temperance Hotel. The Belfast Revaluation of 1900 records that the hotel was managed by a Mr S. McCausland and comprised 19 rooms, a bathroom, and two kitchens, accessed from Wellington Place. The property was substantially revalued to £110. By 1900, the ground floor of the building facing onto College Square East had been separately converted into a tobacconist's shop administered by a Mrs Julia Byrne, individually valued at £21. The combined rent for the hotel and tobacconist's shop was settled at approximately £120 per annum. The 1900 revaluation also recorded that ownership of the entire terrace had passed to a Ms Sarah White, who was thereafter noted as lessor.

The Balmoral Temperance Hotel continued in operation until 1903, when the corner building was converted to commercial and office premises. The tobacconist's shop — by then known as the Cooke Cigar and Tobacco Store — continued to operate from the College Square East ground floor until 1906. Following the hotel's closure, the Wellington Place side of the building was converted into two ground-floor retail units and office space above. The upper floors, called the Balmoral Buildings, were occupied by solicitors' firms, linen stores, and the offices of a publishing company called Blackie & Son Ltd. The ground-floor retail units were occupied by George Prescott's opticians and the Ulster Ladies Work Depot. As a result of this conversion, the total value of the corner building rose to £325 10s. in 1903.

In 1906 the building was purchased by the estate of Vance & Brown, which established a Land and Insurance Agency on the ground-floor College Square East side, administered by a Mr F. Scott Martin, who also served as valuer and secretary of the Belfast Mutual Building Society. By 1918 the upper floors of the Balmoral Buildings continued to be occupied by solicitors and other private businesses, and also housed a number of local architects and engineers, including the architect Robert S. Hill and the engineering firm of Dobson & Son. George Prescott continued to occupy one ground-floor unit, while the other was taken by a tailor.

By the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland in 1935, the total value of the corner building had risen to £427 5s. No further revaluation was carried out for over two decades due to the Second World War, but by the second revaluation of 1956–72 the value had increased further to £600 15s. By the end of that revaluation in 1972, Vance & Brown retained ownership of the property. In the 1970s the ground-floor units were occupied by George Prescott's opticians and the Belfast Gold Exchange, while the upper floors of the Balmoral Buildings continued in office use.

The commercialisation of the terrace in the early 20th century coincided with the construction of the Municipal Technical Building, which opened in 1907, and the subsequent relocation of the professional classes to South Belfast and the newly formed terraces on University Square beside Queen's University. The closure of the Balmoral Temperance Hotel around 1906 may have been a factor connected with the opening of the Technical Building the following year. The building was listed in 1976 and has since continued in commercial use. It was sympathetically restored around 1983 and retains its original small-pane sash windows.

SETTING

The building forms part of a terrace of former townhouses lining the east side of College Square East, returning onto Wellington Place. The neighbouring properties are No. 58 Wellington Place and Nos. 14–16 College Square East.