Court House, Main Street, Limavady, Co Londonderry

Court House, Main Street, Limavady, County Londonderry

A single-storey building of smooth red brick with a pink diamond-patterned asbestos slate roof, erected in 1914 and designed by County Surveyor C L Boddie. The building is seven bays wide and features a dominant central two-stage tower containing the entrance door, which rises through the front roof line. The tower projects slightly forward from the front wall and is topped by a steep pitched pyramid roof, its soffit supported on corbelled modillions above a decorative string course. Three faces of the upper tower stage are punctuated with round-headed windows framed by brick label moulding embellished with hefty keystones and square block stops. A moulded cill course encompasses the tower, below which sits a blank arcade of four arches, with a crude cornice defining the two stages. Windows and doors throughout have square heads and are linked by a decorative sandstone string course.

The building divides into three functional parts. The front block contains a porch, waiting hall, interview rooms, a bridewell, and toilets. A similar block to the rear contains a side entrance office, magistrate's room, and toilets. These are linked by the courtroom, which measures internally approximately 11 metres by 9.5 metres by 3.9 metres high. The plan form is thus an elongated "H". The courtroom is well proportioned with consistent detailing, and the elongated hall features good neo-classical joinery details to doors, door-cases, and screens executed in an Arts and Crafts manner.

The overall composition is domestic in scale with poor detailing and appears to have suffered from the use of cheap facing materials, possibly due to cost reductions. Some brick detailing is similar to the Ogilby Trust National School of 1897, particularly beneath the gable overhangs. The building's one-storey height is at variance with the two and three-storey character of the remainder of the street, though it observes the general street building line.

The building replaced an earlier neo-classical courthouse of 1830, built by the Grand Jury at a cost of 850 pounds, which still stands in Irish Green Street. The Court House remains in use and is well maintained, performing an important social function prominently located on Main Street. However, its architectural shortcomings and recent date exclude it from listing.