Clarendon Building, Clarendon Quay, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 3AL

Clarendon Building, Clarendon Quay, Belfast

A single-storey former pump house for Clarendon graving docks, built around 1825, located at Clarendon Dock on the west side of Belfast Harbour, north of Belfast Harbour Office. The building has an I-shaped footprint, originally comprising an arcaded central workshop terminated by a classically proportioned single-storey pump house to the east and a one-and-a-half storey rendered Dock Master's house to the west. It has now been refurbished for office use.

The central and east blocks have replacement hipped natural slate roofs with leaded ridges and hips; the east roof is partially concealed by a stucco parapet. Half-round cast-iron rainwater goods are mounted on projecting tooled stone eaves to the central and west blocks, with parapet gutters to the east block and French drains to the perimeter. A rendered chimneystack rises from the gable of the west block, and a brick chimney on a curved base sits on the party wall between the central and west blocks. A continuous modern rooflight runs along the ridge of the central section, with several rooflights to each pitch.

The central block is constructed of rubble stone bedded in lime mortar with tooled ashlar sandstone dressings. The east block is rock-faced dressed blackstone laid in irregular courses with fine joints over a narrow stone plinth and has stucco dressings. The west block is ruled-and-lined rendered with a projecting plinth and corner banding rising to pedimented gables.

Openings are generally round-headed except where otherwise stated. Those to the central block are set in tooled stone surrounds with replacement margin-paned glazing. Those to the east and west blocks have moulded archivolts set within slightly recessed wide surrounds framed by further stucco archivolts, generally plain except where otherwise stated. Replacement timber windows throughout consist of multi-paned casements to the east block and 1/1 sashes to the west block. Stone sills are painted and projecting.

The central (workshop) block features eight arcaded openings to the north and south, each surmounted by a rectangular panel with a tooled ashlar surround. Replacement stone cills sit over a concrete plinth; the arches were formerly open. The block is terminated by the pump house to the east and the Dock Master's house to the west.

The west block (Dock Master's house) is identical one bay deep to the north and south, with an arched window recessed within a similarly profiled keyblocked arch to the ground floor and a rectangular side-hung casement with plain architrave to the upper floor. The west elevation has three openings wide to each floor arranged about a central entrance comprising a round-arched half-glazed replacement timber door detailed as window openings.

The east block (Pump house) is classically proportioned and three openings wide, with a stucco parapet punctuated by panelled piers over pilasters to each corner and between openings to the east front. It has a plain frieze and moulded cornice; pilasters are panelled to the upper portion and reeded below. The east front comprises a central replacement glazed timber door flanked by a window on either side. The south elevation has three round-arched windows, with those to the centre and left sharing a reveal and moulded rather than plain archivolts on the central window, outer archivolts on plinth blocks; that to the right is taller and narrower. The north elevation has a replacement panelled timber door to the left and a window to the right.

The former pumping station is set between two graving docks at Clarendon Dock—the late eighteenth-century Graving Dock no. 1 and the early nineteenth-century Graving Dock no. 2—opening to Belfast Lough at the east. Immediately to the west is the former furnace house, and a short distance to the south is the Harbour Office. The area has undergone substantial late twentieth-century public realm works, and the complex is now set on a paved terrace with contemporary office developments to the north, public sculpture ('Dividers' by Vivien Burnside) to the east, and car parking to the west. Vehicular access is from Corporation Street; pedestrian access is from Donegall Quay. A late nineteenth-century replacement pump house is located to the west.