4 Station Road, Belfast, Sydenham, BT4 1RE

A timber-framed house built in the 1880s as the gardener's house for the now demolished villa known as 'The Den', located in Sydenham, Belfast. The house was constructed at the same time as the adjacent No. 2 Station Road and 'The Den' villa itself, all commissioned by Gustav Wilhelm Wolff (1843-1913), the prominent shipbuilder and businessman who founded Harland and Wolff shipyard in 1862 and the Belfast Ropework Company in the mid-1870s. Wolff purchased the site in 1873, which had previously been occupied by a residence known as Mary's Cottage or Chester Cottage. He was elected Conservative Member of Parliament for East Belfast in 1892 and retired in 1908, eventually moving to his London residence. Evidence from Ordnance Survey maps of 1894 and valuers' records from 1884 suggests that both Station Road houses were built contemporaneously with the villa.

The building takes a T-plan form, comprising an east-end gable-ended block with a north-south axis and a taller roof, attached to a long rectangular gable-ended block to the west with an east-west axis and slightly lower roof. Both blocks are constructed in the Tudor Revival style, though this is not genuine timber-framing but rather pseudo-half-timbered work typical of the era. The building never possessed the same quality of external detail as the adjacent No. 2 Station Road, with considerably less half-timber-framing visible.

The east-end block features a decorated ridge piece and a tall brick chimney stack with three ceramic pots. The north gable contains a central window with top-hung casement, framed by a grid of wooden wall studs with a tree-stud arrangement above. The south gable, being less visible, has a simpler central window with plain top-hung casement and wall studding confined only to the area above the window. At ground-floor level, the north gable has two camber-headed windows, both with top-opening casements. A glass lean-to conservatory, apparently added in the 1960s, has been attached to the east end.

The west-end block is a long rectangular range with an east-west axis and slated roof without decorated ridge piece. It features a plain brick chimney and three unattractive dormer windows (two on the north side, one on the south), which appear to be 1950s or 1960s additions with flat roofs and side-opening casements. The front door is located on the north side near the junction with the east block, with a small window beside it. Further south, a large sliding garage door, apparently a 1960s addition, opens onto what was originally the main elevation. The rear or south side of the west block, which has been dug into the hillside, contains a back door at the east end and a window, both of which are relatively modern replacements.

The interior has been substantially altered, particularly during the 1960s and 1970s, and retains very few original features. The house has been spoiled by the addition of flat-roofed dormers and other twentieth-century modifications that have compromised its original character as a late Victorian outbuilding associated with a significant local businessman's estate.