Coleraine Orange Hall, 3 Union Street, Coleraine, BT52 1QB

Coleraine Orange Hall, 3 Union Street, Coleraine

This detached, symmetrical two-storey red brick Orange Hall was built in 1911 to the designs of local architect and engineer Samuel John McFadden (d. 1932), who at the time served as surveyor for Coleraine Rural District Council and had maintained a private practice in the town since 1907. It was the first purpose-built building constructed to house the Orange Lodges of Coleraine and its environs. The building is rectangular on plan, faces north, and occupies a corner site at the junction of Union Street and Brook Street, with an enclosed front area.

The roof is covered in natural slate with terracotta ridge tiles and lead ridges, and features a pair of hipped eaves sections flanking the central pediment. Ogee-moulded cast-iron guttering is supported on a corbelled eaves cornice, with square-profile cast-iron downpipes. Two tall red brick chimneystacks rise from both side elevations, each with a slight breakfront below the eaves, red brick curved brackets, and terracotta pots. The walls are of machine-made red brick laid in English garden wall bond, with gauged brick arched window openings, painted masonry sills, and replacement uPVC windows throughout.

The symmetrical front elevation is three bays wide. The central bay rises well above the eaves and is surmounted by a bracketed open-bed pediment framing a keystone oculus. Beneath this sits a shallow three-sided canted oriel window, constructed entirely of painted masonry including its base, transomed and mullioned window frame, and roof. The first floor has segmental-headed window openings, while the ground floor has paired square-headed window openings with splayed lintels and sills and a central mullion. The round-headed entrance is set below the oriel and features a channel-rusticated, deeply-splayed surround with an oversized hood moulding on squat brackets, broken at the apex by an advanced keystone that rises to the base of the oriel above. The entrance retains its original double-leaf Tudorbethan hardwood doors and a coloured leaded glazed fanlight bearing the inscription "Coleraine / Orange Hall". The door opens onto a concrete step and the paved front area.

The east side elevation is five bays wide, with two raised chimneystacks and plainer eaves detail. Window openings are square-headed to the first floor and segmental-headed to the ground floor. The gabled rear elevation is blank apart from a diminutive red brick chimneystack. The west side elevation mirrors the east, but with one tall window to the front set within a shallow full-height recess. A later square-headed door opening to the right, dating from around 1960, leads to concrete steps and a glazed entrance screen.

The ground floor retains some of its original internal detailing and the roof structure is also intact, though the windows throughout have been replaced.

Tenders for the building were invited in 1909, as recorded in the Irish Builder, and construction was carried out by a Mr. William Callaghan, himself a member of the Orange Order. The land on which the hall stands was donated by Hugh T. Barrie (1860–1922), Member of Parliament for North Londonderry from 1906 to 1918 and a member of the Order. The foundation stone was laid on Easter Monday, 28th March 1910, and the hall was officially opened on Easter Monday, 17th April 1911, by Mrs. Barrie, with an address given by Hugh Barrie and the Reverend Canon Dudley. The estimated cost of construction was £15,000, raised largely through subscription from members and the general public.

Before this hall was built, the Orange Lodges of the area — including Lodges nos. 5, 316, 355 and 735, and Royal Black Preceptories nos. 37 and 39 — had met at a schoolhouse on the neighbouring Brook Street, which had served as a meeting place for approximately fifteen years prior to the decision in 1907 to erect a permanent shared hall. Before that, the lodges had met at the Constituency Offices on New Row in the late 19th century. Following its completion, Lodges nos. 316, 355 and 735 met at the new hall, which was initially valued at £22 in the Annual Revisions. By 1935, under the First General Revaluation of property in Northern Ireland, this had risen to £55, and by 1956 to £64, a figure at which it remained through the end of the second revaluation in 1972.

The building has had a varied history of use. Shortly after its completion, the upper floor served as Coleraine's first picture house. During the Second World War, the hall was requisitioned and converted into a local headquarters for the Royal Air Force, with the local lodges again forced to use temporary premises until the war's end. Photographs from the early 20th century and successive editions of the Ordnance Survey maps from 1904 to 1967 show that the layout and façade of the hall have not been discernibly altered over the past century.

The hall continues to serve as the meeting place for Coleraine's local Orange Lodges. At the time of survey, Lodges nos. 5, 87, 316 and 735, and Royal Black Preceptories nos. 37, 99 and 212 shared the building. In 2011, as part of centenary celebrations, one of the upper rooms was converted into an educational resource centre for the teaching of Ulster Scots. A room within the hall is also used as a small museum commemorating the history of the Orange Order in Coleraine.

The building is not considered to be of sufficient architectural or historical interest to warrant listing on the statutory register, but is nevertheless of interest to the local community.