9 Mill Street, Cushendall, Co.Antrim

9 Mill Street, Cushendall, County Antrim

This is a terraced single-bay three-storey rendered former house, constructed in the early 19th century — likely as early as 1834, though first recorded with certainty on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1857. It stands in the centre of Cushendall village on the north west side of Mill Street, forming part of a continuous terrace of similarly scaled buildings. It is flanked by No. 7b Mill Street to its north east and No. 11 Mill Street to its south west.

Architectural Description

The building is rectangular on plan, facing southeast as part of an unbroken terrace. The roof is pitched and covered in natural slate with black clay ridge tiles, cast-iron rainwater goods, and a shared rendered chimney stack to the north east party wall. The walling is finished in painted ruled-and-lined render with rusticated rendered quoins to the left. Window openings are square-headed with painted concrete sills and replacement horizontally-glazed timber sliding sash windows with ogee horns.

The single-bay three-storey front elevation features a replacement timber shopfront spanning the entire ground floor. This consists of a central fixed-pane timber display window on a concrete sill, flanked by two square-headed door openings. All openings are flanked by fluted timber pilasters supporting a lead-lined plain timber fascia. The door to the right is a replacement timber panelled and glazed door giving access to the ground floor unit; the door to the left is a replacement timber panelled door providing access to the upper floors.

The south west side abuts No. 11 Mill Street, and the north east side abuts No. 7b Mill Street. The single-bay three-storey rear elevation is largely obscured by a flat-roofed two-storey rear extension finished in rough-cast cement render, with paired 1-over-1 timber sliding sash windows.

Historical Background

The majority of the two- and three-storey buildings along the north side of Mill Street were erected in the first half of the 19th century by the Turnly family, who were the local landowning family. Francis Turnly, Cushendall's proprietor, had travelled to China in 1796 where he accumulated a fortune of around £75,000. In 1801 he used this money to purchase the estate of Newtownglens from the Richardson family for £24,000, subsequently renaming the settlement Cushendall. At the time of purchase, Cushendall consisted of little more than a handful of insignificant cabins, a mill, and a bridge. As the number of tourists travelling through the area — en route to the Giant's Causeway — increased, Turnly, described by the architectural historian Brett as an eccentric character who "effected extraordinary improvements in buildings and roads on his property", developed the village into a coastal resort. Hotels such as the Glens of Antrim on Shore Street and numerous commercial properties were erected during this period.

No. 9 Mill Street is likely to date from as early as the Townland Valuations of 1834, though it is difficult to identify specific structures in that source due to the loss of the accompanying Townland Valuation Town Plan for Cushendall. The building was first recorded with certainty on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1857, and in Griffith's Valuation of 1859, which noted that it was valued at £6 and 15 shillings and was initially leased by the McDonnell family of Kilmore House to a Mr Henry McAuley.

In 1880, ownership passed to the McAlister family, who retained ownership until at least the 1970s, though the occupants changed with considerable frequency over the following decades. In 1911, the site was occupied by James McNeill, a local butcher. The census building return of that year described No. 9 as a second-class dwelling consisting of four rooms, with two cow houses, a piggery, a fowl house, and a potato house in its rear yard.

During the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57), the building was occupied by Hugh McSparran, a local butcher and flesher. This revaluation recorded the ground floor shopfront for the first time and increased the building's assessed value to £16. McSparran continued to operate his butcher's shop from the address until his death in 1949. The building's value was subsequently reduced to £10 and 10 shillings by the end of the Second General Revaluation (1956–72), reflecting the closure of the ground floor shop around 1960.

In 1972, the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society's guide to the Glens of Antrim described Nos 9–23 Mill Street as "a long terrace of three-storey rendered houses with quoins, all with similar proportions and detailing, but most rather dreary … the shops in the terrace have simple fascias." The guide described Mill Street more broadly as "an outstandingly good street by Ulster standards; there is almost nothing to jar the eye … this street demands, and deserves, the most careful and sensitive consideration of any change of any kind." The buildings along Mill Street were included in the Cushendall Conservation Area in 1975 — only the second conservation area in the province to have been designated at that time, a fact described as testimony in itself to the special qualities of the village. That year Cushendall was also chosen as one of Northern Ireland's four pilot schemes for conservation during the European Architectural Heritage Year. No. 9 Mill Street was subsequently listed in 1976.

Alterations

Around 1980, the building underwent an interior reorganisation: the ground floor was converted into a café and the upper floors into a pair of self-contained apartments. Between 1995 and 1997, the building underwent more extensive alteration, including the construction of the modern flat-roofed two-storey rear extension, the replacement of all interior floors and staircases, the installation of new windows and doors throughout, the construction of the current shopfront, and the re-slating of the roof with Bangor Blue slates. Despite the loss of original historic detailing to both the interior and exterior, No. 9 remains an integral component of this early terrace on Mill Street, and retains group value with its terraced neighbours. It is of local interest within the historic village centre.