31 Millburn Road, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT52 1QT

31 Millburn Road is a mid-Victorian semi-detached house completed by 1865, forming the eastern half of a pair originally known as 'Fountain Villas'. The building stands on the east side of Millburn Road in Coleraine town centre, overlooking The Rose Gardens and Alexander Park, on an elevated site with gravelled driveway and front garden bounded by a rubblestone wall with freestone coping.

The house is a two-bay two-storey L-shaped gabled structure with Gothic-style detailing. The plan features a breakfront to the gable and an oblique gabled entrance porch set into the re-entrant angle. A two-storey gabled return projects to the rear, with modern lean-to and single-storey flat-roof extensions of no architectural interest.

The pitched roof is covered in natural slate with angled ridge tiles. Chimneystacks are rendered with tall clay pots. Decorative timber bargeboards with finials terminate the gables. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods sit on projecting bracketed timber eaves, with cast-iron downpipes and hoppers. The walling is painted ruled-and-lined render above a contrasting plinth, with a chamfered corner to the northeast wall of the return.

The principal elevation faces west, with the gabled bay at the right advancing beneath offsets at ground floor. The gabled bay contains a bipartite timber mullioned window to each floor. A carved and painted plaque dated 1865 is positioned over the first floor window. The left bay has a narrow horizontally divided 2/2 window at ground floor. The porch to the re-entrant angle features heavy timber bargeboards and is accessed by two sandstone steps. The original timber-sheeted door has decorative cast-iron strap-hinges and door furniture set in a shouldered reveal with a glazed quatrefoil above.

The north gable contains a mullioned 2/2 timber window at first floor over paired 2/2 windows with a continuous corbelled sill, set in a painted render surround with stepped head. Windows throughout are replacement timber sash with contrasting reveals and projecting painted sills. The gabled return to the rear features two first-floor windows above a small slated boiler house. The north elevation includes a timber mullioned 2/2 window with corbels under the sill at ground floor right, and a low timber-sheeted door with cast-iron door furniture at left. The south elevation is abutted by the adjoining building.

To the rear, a modern painted render outbuilding provides access to a long rectangular lawned garden. The house was listed in 1981, and renovations including a conservatory extension were carried out during the 1980s.

The building has group value both with number 29 and with other Victorian dwellings along Millburn Road, forming an important element in Coleraine's architectural heritage. The pair is notable for their well-preserved mid-Victorian proportions and detailing, illustrating the town's development in the mid-nineteenth century.

The property was completed for David Baxter around 1865. Millburn Road was laid out as a new route to Portrush and Portstewart following an Irish Society deputation of 1834, with construction progress noted in 1840. During this work, a spring was exposed on the eastern side of the road, which gave its name to 'Fountain Villas'. Until 1860, the Olphert estate to the north could only be farmed, but in January 1860 Chancery Court permission was obtained for 99-year leases. In March 1860 the Olphert estate advertised villa sites on the east side of Millburn Road from the fountain, though building did not commence until after the launch of the Coleraine Building Society in 1864. Each house entered valuation records around 1866, valued at £13 and 10 shillings together with garden and office. The first recorded occupier at number 31 was John Baxter, who leased the house from David Baxter. Subsequent occupiers included Robert John Pressley (1868/9), Daniel C Gillespie (1888), James Lynn (1890), James R Linton (1895), Mary Ann Wright (1896), and Marion Wright (1927). Mary Ann Wright was a widow living with her three daughters, two of whom worked as dressmakers. The eight-room house was classified as first class, and by 1911 only two of the sisters remained, one as housekeeper and the other continuing as a dressmaker.