Sacred Heart Parochial Hall, Gracehill Court, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT14

Sacred Heart Parochial Hall

The Sacred Heart Parochial Hall is a symmetrical five-bay two-storey red-brick building situated on Gracehill Court to the west side of Oldpark Road in Belfast. Built in 1923–24 to designs by architect Francis McArdle, it is dated 1924. Although the building displays fine stone and brick detailing and retains much of its original character, it has been compromised by modern alterations and is not among the best examples of its type.

The hall is rectangular on plan with a central breakfront and gabled end bays to the southeast; a modern single-storey extension has been added to the northeast. The hipped roof is covered with natural slate and features blue and black angled ridge tiles with leaded hips. Concrete kneeler stones finish the gables, with decorative concrete corbels to the northeast and southwest elevations. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods sit on corbelled brick eaves.

The walling is English garden wall-bonded red-brick with a contrasting painted plinth to the facade. Sandstone dressings include a decorated string-course between floors and terracotta panels to the porches. The upper sections of the southeast gables and other elevations have dry dash finish with painted smooth render plinth. Windows are predominantly round-headed replacement five-paned timber casements with flush concrete sills. Semi-circular arched window openings on the first floor feature projecting concrete sills and stepped brick apron panels, with some boarded over; narrow two-paned lights serve the southeast porches. Moulded heads form a string-course at impost levels. Replacement timber-framed windows of varied designs appear to the rear.

The principal southeast elevation is symmetrically composed. A pedimented central breakfront contains two windows at each floor and bears a sandstone plaque inscribed "SACRED HEART / PAROCHIAL HALL" between floors. The corniced pediment rests on decorative dropped brick piers stepped at their base and linked by a dentilled brick course. A moulded sandstone roundel inscribed "1924" occupies the tympanum. Flanking bays are each two windows wide. The gabled end bays are identical, with a multi-paned semi-circular arched window to the first floor and replacement metal entrance doors with timber-boarded transom lights at ground floor, fronted by plain metal gates. The doors are surmounted by a sandstone broken pediment on ornately carved console brackets, flanked by narrow round-headed windows and accessed via concrete steps.

The southwest elevation has a modern metal door at ground floor left. The northwest (rear) elevation is simply detailed, with nine irregularly-arranged windows at first floor and five round-headed windows to the ground floor, including a small window at ground floor right. The northeast elevation has a window to first floor right and is abutted at ground floor right by the modern red-brick lean-to extension.

The hall is enclosed to three sides by a low brick wall topped with modern metal railings. A modern single-storey red-brick annexe stands to the northwest. The building is accessed from Ardlea Street to the northwest; Gracehill Court is laid with brick paviors. The setting is a residential housing estate of twentieth-century two-storey terraced housing, with the Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church to the southeast.

Historical Context

The parochial hall was commissioned in the aftermath of serious sectarian violence associated with partition. Fifty-seven houses had been razed to the ground in the Marrowbone district (locally known as the 'Bone), a small Catholic community in North Belfast, and rebuilding was aided by the American Committee for Relief in Ireland, which distributed funds through the White Cross Society. The Society, managed by Quaker businessman James G Douglas, was established specifically to provide aid to victims of early 1920s violence and undertook to support the building financially. The Society also obtained government sanction for the scheme to be registered under the Unemployment Relief Grant. The White Cross Building Society carried out the building work.

The two-storey hall originally comprised a billiard room equipped with three large tables, a recreation room, a reading room and cloakroom on the upper floor, and a concert hall, stage and lavatories on the ground floor, with a dressing room and 'operating room' on the mezzanines at each end. The concert hall could accommodate 1,000 people and its floor was specially prepared for dancing. The building incorporated steel and concrete joists with reinforced concrete floors, was heated throughout and had electric lighting. The floors of vestibules and passages were of terrazzo marble. Leaded lights were supplied by Clokey of Belfast. The formal opening took place on Monday 5 December 1924. In recent years the building has been extended to the rear and continues in use as a parochial hall.