2 Bridge St., Cushendall, Co.Antrim

No. 2 Bridge Street is a former end-of-terrace house, now used as a hotel, built prior to 1859 and possibly dating from around 1830. It stands on the south-west side of Bridge Street in the centre of Cushendall village, constructed as one of a pair with its immediate neighbour, No. 4 Bridge Street, to which it abuts on the north-west. The building is rectangular in plan, faces north-east, and sits below road level, accessed from a sunken front pavement enclosed by a cement-rendered retaining wall and steel railings. It is two storeys in height with an attic, and three bays wide.

The roof is pitched and covered in natural slate with black clay ridge tiles. There are rendered chimneystacks at either end, the south-east stack carrying three clay pots. Guttering is missing, though a cast-iron downpipe remains. The external walls are finished in painted ruled-and-lined render with painted rusticated quoins.

The north-east front elevation has an asymmetrical arrangement of window openings: on the ground floor, two windows sit to the right of the central square-headed door opening and one to the left. On the first floor, three equally spaced window openings do not align with those below. The door itself has a replacement hardwood sheeted door. Windows throughout are replacement 6/6 sliding timber sash with angled horns and exposed sash boxes. The south-east gable is blind, save for the chimney stack above.

The rear elevation is also two storeys and three bays, with smaller window openings than the front, randomly arranged, all fitted with 1/1 timber sliding sash windows dating from around 1950. A central square-headed door opening at ground floor level is fitted with a steel door. Three small rooflights are set into the rear slope of the roof. The rear elevation's plain, informal composition and the possibility that it reflects an earlier date of construction are noted. There is no evidence of any return. The rear yard is concrete-paved and enclosed by tall cement-rendered walls, with an early rubblestone wall to the north-west only. A small painted rendered outhouse with a tin roof stands to the right side of the yard.

Although original internal detailing has been lost, the exterior retains significant historic fabric. The alterations are considered to detract somewhat from the building's character, but the overall external appearance remains good.

The building may have existed by the time of the 1834 Townland Valuations, though it cannot be identified with certainty in that source due to the loss of the accompanying town plan for Cushendall. It is first recorded with certainty in Griffith's Valuation of 1859, at which point it was valued at £8 and leased by the Turnly family to Michael McCloy, who operated a lodging house from the premises. McCloy remained the recorded occupant until around 1880, when the lodging house passed to his relative Alexander McCloy, a local farmer. By at least 1901, the Census of Ireland recorded the property in the hands of Archibald Thompson, also a farmer. That year's census building return described it as a second-class private dwelling of four rooms, with outbuildings including a stable, piggery, fowl house and turf house. Archibald Thompson remained at No. 2 until his death in 1925, when the house passed to his son Robert Thompson. Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57), the rateable value was raised to £12 and 10 shillings. Robert Thompson purchased the site outright from the Turnly estate in 1967, and by the end of the Second General Revaluation (1956–72) the total rateable value stood at £17 and 10 shillings.

The building was originally abutted on its south-east gable by an additional two-storey-over-cellar building that was contemporary with Nos 2–4 Bridge Street and occupied by a local blacksmith. This neighbouring structure was demolished in the mid-1970s to make way for the road now running along the River Dall, leaving No. 2 as the end of its terrace. The building was depicted on the Ordnance Survey Town Plan of 1903 in its current layout, and the building was listed in 1976.

In 1972, the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society described Nos 2–6 Bridge Street as "a continuous terrace of two and three-storey houses, with most glazing-bars complete, of no especial interest, but pleasant and coherent; the dip in the pavement level lends unusual interest to what might otherwise be a little dull." Bridge Street was subsequently included in the Cushendall Conservation Area in 1975, only the second conservation area to have been designated in the province at that time, and in that year Cushendall was also selected as one of Northern Ireland's four pilot schemes for conservation during the European Architectural Heritage Year. General renovation took place in 1984, including reslating in natural slate and the installation of new cast-iron rainwater goods. The building was converted from a private dwelling into a tea room and bed-and-breakfast accommodation around 1991.

Together with No. 4 Bridge Street, with which it has group value, No. 2 forms an intrinsic part of the historic setting of Cushendall village centre.