205 Donegall Street, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 2FL

205 Donegall Street is a terraced, three-storey-over-basement redbrick townhouse built around 1820, forming part of an original terrace of eight similar houses. Numbers 207 to 215 were demolished around 1990, leaving only three survivors on the terrace. The building was restored and partially reconstructed around 1991 to 1993 by Hearth, a historic buildings conservation organisation. Although the loss of original interior fabric and detailing has compromised its integrity, it remains a significant example of late Georgian domestic architecture in Belfast, with strong historic associations with the city's mercantile and professional classes.

Architectural Description

The house is square on plan, set on a slightly elevated site on the east side of Donegall Street at its junction with Carrick Hill, with a small front railed basement area. The pitched roof is finished in natural slate with terracotta ridge tiles, and there is a rebuilt redbrick profiled chimneystack to both party walls. Cast-iron guttering is carried on drive-through brackets fixed to a projecting brick eaves course, with a cast-iron downpipe below.

The external walls are laid in Flemish bond redbrick. Window openings are square-headed with flat brick arches, flush rendered reveals, sandstone sills, and replacement 6-over-6 timber sash windows throughout. The front elevation is two windows wide to the upper floors, with closely spaced openings at ground floor level. To the right of the ground floor is a gauged brick round-headed door opening. The doorcase consists of a projecting moulded surround with a six-panelled timber door flanked by slender timber pilasters, leading up to a simple lintel cornice, with a spoked webbed fanlight set in a scalloped surround. The door opens onto a replacement sandstone platform and steps enclosed by replacement iron railings, which return to enclose the basement area and are set on a replacement sandstone plinth wall.

The north gabled side elevation is blank, having been rebuilt in salvaged brick around 1993. The rear elevation rises to four full storeys — the site follows a prehistoric raised beach, meaning the basement is at ground level to the rear, making the building effectively four storeys in height despite its three-storey appearance from the front. The rear has staggered fenestration reflecting the position of the rear staircase hall, with gauged brick square-headed window openings, sandstone sills, and replacement 6-over-6 timber sash windows. The south side elevation abuts the adjoining house at number 203.

Setting

The house sits at the north end of Donegall Street, where a landscaped raised area buffers the terrace from the street. Each house has a rear yard enclosed by a timber fence, with a tarmac car park behind.

Historical Background

Donegall Street was originally known as Linnenhall Street, named after a brown linen hall that formerly stood near the site of what is now St Anne's Cathedral. It was laid out in the 1750s by the fourth Earl of Donegall. The street was designed to draw the eye northward toward the poorhouse, which closed the vista at the far end. Through the late 18th and 19th centuries it became a busy commercial centre, home to wholesale textile businesses and churches of all three main denominations.

The current terrace of three houses was built after 1796, as part of a wider group that also included a now-demolished adjoining terrace of five. The housing was intended for Belfast's rising middle classes. When the plot was sold to John Milford, a linen draper, the lease included a condition requiring frontages of at least 30 feet in height. The basements of the houses are stone-built, though the upper floors in brick are thought to be of somewhat later date. Charles Brett dated the terrace to 1799, but Marcus Patton, drawing on evidence uncovered during restoration, concluded that construction took place around 1820. The terrace appears on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1832 to 1833 and is listed in the Townland Valuation, where each house was valued at £6 7s 6d.

As originally built, each dwelling comprised a three-storey house with a two-storey scullery return and a single-storey privy and ashpit, a further basement storey, and a rear entry onto York Lane. Early street directories confirm that the terrace was initially favoured by textile merchants, including silk mercers and linen and cotton manufacturers. As industrialisation made central Belfast progressively dirtier and less comfortable, these wealthier residents moved out to Malone and the North Down coast. Bishop Denvir, living in the neighbouring presbytery, recorded complaints about soot and smuts from a biscuit factory opposite, which required frequent redecoration.

Through the 19th century the terrace was taken over by professional people — doctors, dentists, and vets — and by the turn of the 20th century by small business owners and those running employment agencies. The Townland Valuation of 1828 to 1840 records the occupier of number 205 as John Reynolds, who operated a fancy jewellery and toy warehouse further along Donegall Street. He was followed by Robert Gilmore, a pawnbroker, who was resident at the time of Griffith's Valuation of 1856 to 1864. By 1880 the occupier was William Marks, a painter and decorator, whose son Joseph was recorded at the 1901 census living there with his wife and eight-year-old daughter. The house at that time comprised eight rooms and was classified as first class. By 1915 it had been taken over by a Mrs A Robinson, who ran an employment agency for domestic staff; she was followed around 1921 to 1922 by a Mrs Ferris running a similar business. By 1930 the house was home to Patrick Martin, a tram conductor, and by 1940 a P Sosby, hairdresser, had joined as an occupant. By 1950 the house operated partly as a hairdressing salon and partly as a doctor's surgery, a use that continued until the early 1970s when it fell vacant.

Hearth became interested in the terrace in 1985, but the adjoining row of five houses at numbers 201 to 205 was demolished for road widening in 1990. During the subsequent restoration of the surviving three houses between 1991 and 1993, the rear wall of number 201 collapsed before work could begin, owing to decay in the old lintels. A new rear wall to that part of the terrace was built in modern brick, while reclaimed brick was used for repairs to the front elevations. New railings and stone kerbs were fitted, and the doorcases were restored with festooned plaster to the reveals and spiderweb fanlights. The house remains in use as a domestic dwelling.