Telephone Exchange, Nursery Avenue, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT52 1LP

Detached multi-bay three-storey brick Modernist telephone exchange at Nursery Avenue, Coleraine, dated 1957 and designed by E. Reily, Chief Architect to the Ministry of Finance in Northern Ireland. The building was completed around 1959.

The structure is rectangular on plan, aligned east to west, with concrete-framed construction and flat concrete roofs throughout fitted with cast iron box hoppers and downpipes. Brown brick is laid in Flemish bond across the elevations. The north and south elevations feature square-headed window openings with cement surrounds and sills set within triple-height vertical concrete frames. All windows are tripartite steel casements.

A full-height bowed stair block projects to the east, constructed in curved brown brick and glazed on either side with a curtain-wall system. The base of this bowed elevation bears a Portland stone date stone inscribed: "This stone was laid by Sir Gordon Radley K.C.B., C.B.E., Ph.D(Eng), M.I.E.E. Director General of the Post Office 12th January 1957". Fixed steel windows flank this block, rising from ground to roof plate with alternating red glazed panels and clear glass. A square-headed door opening with stone surround and cantilevered concrete canopy marks the northeast entrance. The double-leaf hardwood doors feature deep vertical panels and bronze handles. Above the principal entrance are enamelled bronze letters stating "TELEPHONE EXCHANGE", and below the roof line sits a bronze Royal Insignia "E II R".

The south elevation spans fifteen windows wide with vertical bays articulated by projecting concrete frames and is abutted by a two-storey wing. The west elevation has a chamfered corner and single horizontal window openings at each level with fixed-pane steel windows. The north elevation is sixteen windows wide with tiled surrounds to all windows set within the concrete frames. A blank east elevation is abutted by the bowed stair block.

The foundation stone was formally laid on 12th January 1957 by Sir Gordon Radley in what the local press described as a response to heavy post-war demand for telephones. At that time, 161 applicants were waiting for telephones in the area, and one in every four subscribers across Northern Ireland shared a line. The Coleraine exchange was one of 28 new exchanges planned across the province in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The new automatic and auto-manual exchange replaced an earlier manual exchange situated in the Diamond. Construction cost £290,000, with the building itself at £70,000 and cabling and equipment at £210,000. Contractors were Jack and Teddy Doherty, Coleraine brothers.

The exchange was designed to accommodate equipment for 2,000 subscribers, considered adequate for Coleraine's projected needs, though the town had only 900 subscribers at the time of opening. Two exchanges operated within the building: one automatic serving Coleraine, and one auto-manual through which telephonists controlled trunk calls from surrounding areas of Counties Derry and Antrim.

The site occupies a vacant plot in a suburban location west of Lodge Road, accessed off Nursery Avenue, and is enclosed by tall steel gates. The nineteenth-century land had previously provided sand for a chapel in Long Commons and for a terrace in Nursery Avenue erected in 1890. The building remains in use as a telephone exchange and in the ownership of British Telecom. Despite the miniaturisation of telephony equipment in recent decades, it has become fully automated while retaining its original function. The structure represents a well-proportioned, coherently designed post-war infrastructure building of understated Modernist detailing, retaining a wealth of historic detailing both externally and internally.