The Markets, Lime Market Street, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT52

The Markets, Lime Market Street, Coleraine

This is an arched entrance with flanking pavilions and enclosing walls forming a square open former market yard in Coleraine town centre, constructed in 1829 to designs by Alexander Mitchell and extended in 1877. The markets have been sensitively restored in recent years and the walls and entrance gates are in good condition. They represent the first significant development of Coleraine town centre during the early 19th century and are of considerable historic importance in the story of the town's growth.

Architectural Description

The roofing is pitched natural slate over the arch, hipped over the pavilions, with blue/black angled tiles to the hips. Lead-lined parapet gutters drain via hoppers and cast-iron downpipes. The enclosing walls are built of coursed basalt with sandstone coping; some have a red-brick string-course to the inner face. The principal entrance at the southwest is faced in coursed sandstone with quoins to the upper section.

The pavilions flanking the main entrance have round-headed multi-paned timber windows with projecting sandstone sills. A warehouse incorporated into the northeast wall has metal lattice window frames (glazing lost) with red-brick voussoirs.

The principal entrance at the southwest takes the form of a pedimented semi-circular arched opening with a keyblock, flanked by hipped lean-to roof pavilion-style chambers. Each chamber has a corniced parapet and a window set into a recessed niche (a matching arrangement appears on the northeast elevation). The pediment carries an armorial stone carved in relief to the tympanum. Hanging within the arch is the original town curfew bell, comprising a bronze bell on timber struts with a metal lever, though the rope is lost. The entrance is closed by tall iron gates with arrow-head finials.

The northwest boundary wall is not visible from outside; its southwest face has a 20th-century slated timber lean-to abutment and a segmental arched opening leading to an adjoining market space. The northeast boundary wall is pierced by two sandstone elliptical arched openings, each containing metal gates of the same design as those at the southwest entrance. The east side incorporates a gabled warehouse with seven metal lattice window openings arranged at three heights, with evidence of two further blocked openings to the right. The southeast elevation is concealed from view; its inner face has a blind segmental arched opening.

A sandstone plaque is inscribed: "ERECTED / by the / WORSHIPFUL THE CORPORATION OF / COLERAINE / MSCCCXXIX / And opened as a public market space on the first day of January, / MDCCCXXX. / Hugh Lyle, Esq. Mayor / H. B. BERRESFORD, ESQ. CHAMBERLAIN. / MR ALEXR MITCHELL, ARCHT & BUILDER."

An extension to the west was added using sand-lime brick walling.

Historical Background

The markets were built on land leased by Dr. John Boyd, Member of Parliament for Coleraine, of Dundooan House, at a total cost of £2,783, of which £1,500 was provided by Robert Conn of Limavady. The enclosure measured 200 feet by 157 feet and, when completed, included a gatehouse, stores and sheds along the northwest and southeast walls, and a weighbridge. It served as the town's butter, potato, corn and flax market, with each commodity traded on specific days of the week. Before the markets were built, grain, meal, potatoes and pork were traded at the Diamond in the centre of the town; the new markets allowed this trade to be relocated away from the municipal centre at Boyd's urging.

The architect, Alexander Mitchell, was a local engineer also engaged by Boyd in connection with other projects, including a hotel he constructed in Portrush. It is worth noting that the design of the pedimented gatehouse bears a close resemblance to the gate lodge at Beardiville House, thought to have been designed by the English architect Richard Elsam around 1810, and that earlier structure may have served as an inspiration for Mitchell's design some two decades later.

Despite the name, Lime Market Street — which provides the southern approach — was not named after this enclosure, which did not trade in lime, but after a separate lime market located off Beresford Road.

The first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1830 recorded the newly completed market in its rectangular layout. By the second edition of 1849–50, the building was captioned as "New Market," though no significant changes to its layout had occurred. Griffith's Valuation of 1858 recorded a greatly increased value of £300, reflecting the value of trade duties rather than any structural change, and noted that the markets were administered by the Town Commissioners of Coleraine.

In 1877, an extension was added to the northwest wall, which included the construction of a two-storey building extending inward from that wall, and the creation of a second enclosed area outside the original market walls facing onto New Market Street — possibly used as an enclosure for animals and livestock, given its wide access from the street. The architect responsible for the 1877 extension is unknown, but the builder was Robert Maxwell, a local contractor. In 1883 the Town Commissioners took possession of the site from the previous owner, John Glenn.

A stand-alone corrugated iron shed was erected in the mid-20th century, at some point between the fifth edition Ordnance Survey map of 1949 and the 1967 survey. Since that date, the majority of the retail sheds and stores that once lined the southwest, southeast and northeast walls have been demolished. The structures that survive within the enclosure are the southern gatehouse, the two-storey 1877 extension, a number of single-storey slated lean-to sheds along the northwest wall, and the mid-20th-century corrugated iron shed.

The markets were listed in 1977. Writing in 1979, the architectural historian Alistair Rowan described them as "a large open area bounded by a coursed basalt wall with two segmental sandstone arches on the North and a vernacular pedimented archway flanked by single-bay pavilions on the South."

Setting

The markets are situated in Coleraine town centre, accessed from Lime Market Street to the southwest and New Market Street to the northeast. The quality of the setting, particularly the approach from Lime Market Street at the southeast, has unfortunately been degraded: tarmacadam has replaced the original cobbles and the buildings lining the street have been significantly altered.