8 Dhu Varren Park, Portrush, Co. Antrim, BT56 8EN

8 Dhu Varren Park is a two-bay, two-storey mid-terrace rendered townhouse with a dormer attic, built around 1908 and located on the south side of Dhu Varren Park in Portrush. It forms part of a coherent group of six Edwardian townhouses built as part of the early twentieth-century suburban expansion, though the terrace was constructed relatively late and is not considered of special architectural or historic interest.

The building is square on plan with a projecting ground floor to the front and a full-height gabled return to the rear. The pitched natural slate roof features terracotta angled ridge tiles and a yellow-brick chimneystack. Timber bargeboards and terracotta finials adorn the gables. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods sit on projecting eaves. The walling is painted smooth render with a scotia moulded string-course supporting the rainwater goods between first floor and attic.

The principal elevation faces north with two wall-head dormer windows to the attic positioned over three windows at first-floor level, with the right pair grouped together. Windows throughout are original 1/1 timber sashes with margin panes and multi-paned top-lights with horns, set in stop-end chamfered reveals with projecting painted sills. The grouped windows to the right have bullnose continuous sills. A monopitched red tiled roof covers the projecting ground floor. The entrance at left features a replacement raised-and-fielded four-panel timber door with a modern cast-iron knocker, set in a stop-end chamfered reveal and accessed via a modern terracotta tiled step. An original timber transom light with margin panes and multi-paned top-lights sits above the door. The east and west elevations are abutted by adjoining buildings. The south (rear) elevation has a full-height gabled return with a large uPVC window to the second floor.

The property stands on a rectangular plot in a residential area directly opposite the Coleraine-Portrush train-line and Dhu Varren halt. A yard to the rear, enclosed by smooth rendered walls, contains a modern metal up-and-over garage door at the left. The front features a lawned garden with a bitumac pathway to the entrance, enclosed by timber fencing and mature hedging, with a modern timber latchgate to the entrance from Dhu Varren Park.

Built around 1908 and first shown on the fourth edition Ordnance Survey map of 1922–31, the terrace was originally named Grangemount and entered valuation records in 1908 as a newly built vacant row. Number 3 was built by James Lyon, manager of Ballyrashane Creamery, and the remainder by James Kennedy, who was in residence at number 5 by 1910 and let the remaining houses to various tenants. After the First World War the houses were sold individually and became separately owned and let, occasionally as boarding houses serving the flourishing resort of Portrush. The first recorded occupier of number 8 was Godfrey Wefers in 1910, followed by Annie Graham (a boarding house keeper) by 1914, then J G Sprott and Maude Steede (1927) and Michael Keenan (1928). Valuer's notes record the house was purchased for £600 in 1931 with alterations and improvements totalling £200. The building continues in use as a domestic house.