63-65 Main Street, Portrush, Co. Antrim, BT56 8BN

A two-bay, two-storey and two-and-a-half-storey commercial premises with traditional Art Nouveau shop-front, built around 1900 and located on the west side of Main Street in Portrush town centre. The building is one of the few remaining traditional shop-fronts in the town and is relatively well-preserved and of good quality. It exemplifies the more domestic scale of buildings that characterise Main Street's architectural character and reflects the commercial boom in Portrush at the turn of the century.

The building is square on plan with a two-storey return and two-storey extension to the rear. The principal northeast elevation is divided into two bays over a projecting full-width shop-front. The right bay is half a storey higher than the left, with an attic window to the gable.

The roof is pitched natural slate with blue and black angled ridge tiles. A rendered chimneystack with two terracotta pots and decorative bargeboards tops the gabled bay. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods include a cast-iron downpipe and hopper; plastic guttering is fitted to the canted bay window. The walling is painted smooth render.

Windows comprise 2/2 timber sash with horns to the upper floors, 1/1 to the attic window, and plate-glass windows to the ground-floor shop-front. Fully-glazed canted bay windows project from the first floor.

The shop-front is the building's most significant feature. It has recessed entrance porches at the left and centre, each glazed to the right side with a concrete floor and an original single-panel timber door surmounted by a tall plain transom light. Plate-glass windows with timber jambs—the right window carved—sit on painted smooth render stall risers. A fluted pilaster jamb marks the centre, with a painted cast-iron column and decorative cast-iron spandrel bracket at the far right. A double-leaf glazed single-panel timber door with brass pull-handle is surmounted by a plain transom light and set back behind a timber-sheeted ceiling, accessed via two concrete steps flush with the stall riser. A plain fascia is surmounted by an ornate cast-iron balustrade with consoled ends; applied signage reads "The Vintage".

The northwest elevation is abutted by an adjoining building. The southwest elevation is abutted at the left by the two-storey return and a series of modern extensions. An alley to the southwest is enclosed by a rubblestone and red-brick flat-roof outbuilding. The southeast elevation is abutted by another adjoining building. The building is street-fronted to the west side of Main Street with an enclosed yard to the rear accessed via Mark Street Lane.

Historical Context

A building is first shown on the site on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1853, and it is possible that the current shop and dwelling retains some fabric from this early structure. However, the building had radically altered in plan form by the time of the first town plan in 1896 and was further altered in 1908 to provide two separate shops.

Griffith's Valuation (1856–64) describes the building as a "very narrow small shop" with a frontage of 10 feet, functioning as a post office and valued at £10. The building was leased from Patrick Black. The premises were improved in 1876 and the valuation was raised to £12. John Fleming took over as a boot and shoe shop proprietor in 1884. By 1885, the valuation of this shop and its neighbour had altered to £15, suggesting they were of comparable size by that time.

In 1908, the building was altered again to provide two shops and a dwelling house. The two shops comprised a shop and workshop for Thomas Fleming the boot and shoe seller, valued at £12, and a stationery and "fancy warehouse" sublet to Nathan Kamayor and valued at £10. The Fleming family lived over the shop in accommodation valued at £15, which comprised two sitting rooms, five bedrooms, and outbuildings. Valuer's notes show that a doorway on the right of the building leads into the upstairs accommodation. At the 1911 census, John Fleming, who described himself as a "general dealer", lived in the eight-room second-class dwelling above the shop with his wife and six children. The family employed two general domestics, young women aged 15 and 19. Thomas Fleming, the boot and shoe seller, appears not to have been John's son but may have been his brother.

Nathan Kamayor bought the freehold of the shop in 1924. In the 1930s, the accommodation comprised a reception room, two bedrooms, bathroom, WC, kitchen, scullery, and pantry. Kamayor spent "a considerable sum" on converting the two shops into one. In 1953, the shop passed to Charles McConaghy; the McConaghy name is visible painted on the building in the first survey photograph. The premises subsequently became a vintage clothing and furniture shop.

The building was listed in 1977. In the 1990s, renovation work took place to the windows, roof, guttering, and internal doors.