Cenotaph, Garvagh Forest, Main Street, Garvagh, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT51 5EF is a Grade B1 listed building in the Causeway Coast and Glens local planning authority area, Northern Ireland. First listed on 22 June 1977.

Cenotaph, Garvagh Forest, Main Street, Garvagh, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT51 5EF

WRENN ID
old-lead-moth
Grade
B1
Local Planning Authority
Causeway Coast and Glens
Constituency
East Londonderry MP: Mr Gregory Campbell (DUP)
Country
Northern Ireland
Date first listed
22 June 1977
Irish grid reference
C 838 154
Coordinates
54.97914, -6.69101
Source
NI Environment Agency listing

Also on this page: radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

A free-standing Neo-Egyptian and Neo-Classical ashlar sandstone pyramid erected during the mid-19th century by Lord Garvagh, located on an elevated wooded site within Garvagh Forest to the south of Garvagh town and west of the Ballinameen Bridge and forest car park.

The structure is square on plan with four elevations, constructed of coursed local sandstone blocks. The exterior is devoid of markings or carvings except for angled tooling marks along the base course. The pyramid originally featured a square-headed doorway on the south-west elevation, now blocked up and rendered over. The structure stands on a raised square platform of stone flags which terminates along the former doorway on the south-west side. The upper section of the exterior stonework has been rendered over in recent decades. Access to the site is from a path to the north-east. The small elevated site is paved with stone flags and bordered by a low course of chamfered stone blocks.

The cenotaph first appears captioned as such on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1849-53. Lord Garvagh designed the structure as a mausoleum, inspired by his excursion to Egypt during his Grand Tour. The pyramid was erected within the wooded grounds of his demesne and was never utilised as a burial chamber despite having been built with an access doorway. The structure does not appear in Griffith's Valuation records of 1856 or in the Ordnance Survey Memoirs written circa 1830-39. The woodland was valued at £88.50 in 1856 and increased to £106 by the Annual Revisions of 1860-63. The property passed out of the Garvagh family ownership following their departure from Garvagh in 1920 and came into the ownership of Edward Strange by 1923. The cenotaph was restored in the 1970s. The pyramid benefits from its picturesque setting within mature woodland. St Paul's parish church is located to the north-east. Some sandstone blocks have been damaged and sections have been rendered over.

Local climate

Cenotaph, Garvagh Forest, Main Street, Garvagh, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT51 5EF sits in a wetter-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 1,140 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 89% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 75% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 15 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 85% of listed buildings. Of these, 10 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.2°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

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