'Dunvaron', 27 Charles Street, Ballymoney, Co. Antrim, BT53 6DX

'Dunvaron', 27 Charles Street, Ballymoney, is a red brick and roughcast-finished suburban house in a restrained Edwardian Freestyle manner, built in 1908 to designs by architect James Scott of Belfast. It forms one of a matching semi-detached pair with its neighbour, No. 25 ('Arborfield'), and both houses are well-preserved and relatively rare examples of their type in this area, retaining their original form and much of their original external detailing and setting. The group value of the pair is further enhanced by the nearby contemporary listed Technical School, which is executed in a similarly free Edwardian manner.

The property sits on the north-east side of Charles Street, approximately 0.3 kilometres north of Ballymoney town centre. The house is of asymmetric plan and comprises a roughly square main two-storey block, with a single-storey flat-roofed entrance porch to the west side and shallow full-height gabled bays to both the front (south) and rear elevations. The front bay incorporates a further single-storey canted bay at ground floor level. To the north-west there is a single-storey L-shaped outhouse projection with a later garage extension attached, and to the north, spanning between this property and its neighbour, is a small single-storey lean-to projection, itself abutted to the north by a large, later single-storey double garage extension of no architectural interest.

The main block has an overhanging gabled roof, T-shaped in structure, covered in natural Welsh slate with clay ridge tiles. The roofline features plain moulded bargeboards on brackets, two brick chimneystacks — one of which is shared with the neighbouring property — both with pronounced corbelling and clay pots, a gabled dormer to the front and west, and a Velux window to the rear. The kitchen projection has a hipped roof in the same materials, with a relatively slim brick chimneystack to the north-east corner carrying a single clay pot. The canted bay has a shallow hipped roof covered in lead sheeting.

The ground floor walls are finished in red brick, while the upper floor is rendered in pebbledash with cement render quoins and lugged and heeled surrounds to the front and west windows. Window openings are mainly segmental-headed, with those to the canted bay, dormers, and some to the ground floor rear being flat-headed. Most windows are filled with plain one-over-one timber sash frames. The two larger windows to the front elevation and the upper floor rear, the west side of the porch, and the dormers are fitted with mullioned and transomed frames incorporating Art Nouveau style glazing to the upper panes. The cills appear to be sandstone, though this is unconfirmed. The rainwater goods appear to be largely replacement uPVC, also unconfirmed.

On the south elevation, to the far left is the gable of the garage with vehicle access. To its right, the front face of the porch features a timber door with Art Nouveau style glazing above a shelf feature on brackets, an Art Nouveau style brass letterbox, and three tall vertical panels below. The entrance has a sandstone keystone. The full-height bay occupies the left half of the main block and contains four windows to the canted bay, a pair of windows to the first floor, and a roundel window at attic level. To the right of the bay there is a large ground floor window and a similar but smaller window directly above at first floor level; the ground floor window has a narrow sandstone keystone matching that of the entrance. A brick mullion with sandstone coping separates this house from its neighbour.

On the west elevation, the side of the later garage appears to the far left and is of no architectural interest. There are two windows to the main block followed by a further window to the entrance porch; the first two of these windows have patterned glazing to their lower sashes. One window sits at first floor level directly above the porch.

On the north elevation, to the far left is part of the shared lean-to, which has a window to its west-facing inner side. There is a window on the main block and another on the kitchen projection, which also has three doors to its east and south sides. Three windows of various sizes serve the first floor, with a further window to the left at upper landing level. The lean-to merges with the large garage addition, which is of no architectural interest.

To the front of the house there is a garden and a tarmac drive and forecourt. The front garden is enclosed by a brick wall with square brick piers capped in stone, and a gateway fitted with decorative wrought-iron gates. To the rear is a large tarmac yard, to the north of which lies the back garden.

Nos. 25–27 Charles Street were built in 1907–08 on a previously undeveloped site that stood at what was then practically the northern edge of Ballymoney, with only a scattering of largely institutional buildings — most notably the Union Workhouse — further to the north-west. Their construction followed closely after the building of the neighbouring Technical School in 1905–06, and marked the beginnings of the gradual suburbanisation of this end of Charles Street as it merged into Coleraine Road. Reporting on the construction of the pair on 27 February 1908, the Ballymoney Free Press and Northern Counties Advertiser noted that the 'semi-detached villas…which are now nearing completion' were being built for a Mr. Robert Holmes and a Mr. William J. Beattie. These names are confirmed by annotations of 1909 in the valuation book, which record that Mr. Beattie went on to occupy No. 25 and Mr. Holmes No. 27. The houses were erected on part of a plot previously held from the Antrim Estate by a John Henry. The present owners of No. 27 have stated that Robert Holmes — the original owner — was a travelling salesman and that he was responsible for building the pair, keeping No. 27 for himself and selling the adjoining house. Holmes was indeed a commercial traveller, working for local chemists and grocers Baxter's Limited, a company in which Beattie served as Secretary. The available evidence nonetheless suggests that both Holmes and Beattie built the properties jointly. The architect was James Scott of Belfast, and the contractor was William Currie of Coleraine.

In the 1911 census, Holmes is recorded as residing at Dunvaron with his wife Eliza, their four young children, and a domestic servant named Lizzie Chestnut. Following the death of John Baxter in 1918, Robert Holmes became Managing Director of Baxter's Limited, later renaming the firm Robert Holmes Limited. He died in 1945, and after the death of his widow in 1951, Dunvaron passed to their youngest son Norman and his wife Marie. The house remained within the Holmes family until 2017, when it is believed to have been sold, and was sold again in 2019. The house underwent extensive refurbishment in 2017.

The earliest map on which Nos. 25–27 appear is that of 1931, which shows a smaller outbuilding on the site of the present double garage, apparently shared between both properties. By 1951 this had either been completely rebuilt or extended, and a single garage is shown, the latter probably added in the later 1940s.