MC Block, University of Ulster, Magee Campus, Northland Road, Londonderry

MC Block, University of Ulster, Magee Campus, Northland Road, Londonderry

MC Block is a detached, symmetrical, multi-bay, two-storey-with-attic red brick building, constructed around 1895 to designs by the local architect William Barker (1851–1898) as three professors' houses. It sits on an elevated site on the east side of Northland Road, at the western end of the Magee University Campus, immediately adjacent to the Main Building. The listing covers the former house together with the yard walling and garage.

Origins and Historical Context

Magee College was established following the bequest of over £20,000 by Martha Maria Magee upon her death in 1846, directed to the Presbyterian General Assembly to build a college in Ulster. Political disputes, debates over location, and construction delays meant it was nearly two decades before the college opened. Londonderry was selected as the site in 1853, and an architectural competition followed. The Dublin-based architect Edward P. Gribbon's Gothic design was chosen, and the foundation stone was laid on 18th August 1856. The original competition brief had called for eight professors' houses alongside the main college building, but budgetary constraints forced their abandonment. The college officially opened to students on 10th October 1865.

In its first decade the college attracted few students — only eight were enrolled in 1874 — largely because it failed to secure an association with any of Ireland's universities. In 1879 Magee became a constituent college of the Royal University of Ireland, which increased enrolment, aided further by the admission of women students from 1883. This renewed vitality and the generosity of the college's supporters prompted a series of campus additions in the late 19th century. The first professors' houses, originally planned for the mid-19th century, were finally built in 1881 to the south-west of the main college building on what became College Avenue, designed by Young & Mackenzie.

The MC Block was added in 1895, more than a decade later, to the south-east side of the college building. It was considerably larger than the 1881 houses but closely follows their design, making clear that Barker deliberately emulated Young & Mackenzie's earlier work. The Natural Stone Database described the buildings as two-storey plus attic with dormers on the roof and wall dormers to the end bays with Dutch-style gables, noting that the red brick buildings along College Avenue have Corsehill sandstone dressings. The construction of MC Block was one of the last contracts William Barker completed before his death in 1898.

Annual Revisions records set the building's total rateable value at £135 in 1895 and confirmed it was internally divided into three separate dwellings. The 1901 census building return described three first-class dwellings comprising 45 rooms in total, with coal houses and sheds as the only outbuildings. At that time the three houses were occupied by the Reverend John E. Henry (Professor of Theology and College Secretary), Professor Leebody (President of Magee College and Professor of Mathematics and Physics), and the Reverend Henry F. Dickey (Professor of Oriental Literature and Biblical Criticism). Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57), the rateable value was increased to £167.

During the Second World War, several Magee College buildings were requisitioned, but a number of the professors' houses were used as classrooms while remaining students were taught at the Model College on Northland Road. After the war the houses returned to residential use, though by the 1950s not all were fully occupied. In 1950, following the recommendation of the Acheson Report, some professors' houses were converted to student accommodation. By the time of the Second General Revaluation (1956–72), the red brick buildings were being used for administration, teaching, and residential purposes. MC Block specifically was converted to student accommodation in 1953 and continued in that use until at least the 1970s. During the university's expansion in the 1980s it was converted to classrooms, and at the time of the second survey it was in use as a staff common room and for teaching by the Faculty of Health Science, the School of Nursing, and the School of Psychology. The buildings along College Avenue were listed in 1976 and included in the Magee Conservation Area in 2006.

Architectural Character and Style

The block almost exactly replicates the slightly earlier MA and MB blocks by Young & Mackenzie, and its brick and red sandstone detailing also shares much in common with the ME Block on the opposite side of the main neo-Gothic college building on College Avenue. The Dutch-style gabled dormers reflect a Queen Anne influence that enjoyed a popular revival during the High Victorian era. The cogged brick courses, basket-arched lintels, tall profiled chimney stacks, and leaded glass overlights express the Arts and Crafts movement's desire for hand-crafted detailing. The three houses are now connected internally and largely modernised, with some loss of historic fabric.

Exterior Description

The building is irregular on plan, facing east, with three full-height canted bay windows to the front and three rear projections. The roof is hipped natural slate with terracotta ridge tiles, lead valleys, and several profiled red brick chimney stacks with terracotta pots and corbelled-out capstones. Several timber-sheeted gabled dormers carry paired 2/1 timber sash windows and timber bargeboards. Moulded cast-iron guttering is fixed to projecting sandstone eaves supported on two courses of angled (cogged) brick, with cast-iron downpipes. The walls are red brick laid in Flemish bond, with red sandstone trim to a projecting plinth course and a sandstone and angled (cogged) brick string course between the floors. Rubble-stone footings are visible at the base of the front (east) elevation.

Windows are square-headed with flush red sandstone basket-arched lintels, sandstone sills, and 4/1 timber sash windows with slender ogee horns, retaining some historic glass.

The symmetrical front (east) elevation is six bays wide with three full-height three-sided canted bay windows — one at either end and one in the middle — each topped by a Dutch-style wall-head dormer window with curvilinear coping and a ball finial. Two recessed entrance bays each contain a four-centred arched door opening set within a red sandstone doorcase. The original flat-panelled timber doors have bolection mouldings and a leaded, coloured glazed fanlight, and are flanked by Tuscan pilasters with foliate carving to the capitals on raised plinths. The pilasters are surmounted by scrolled and fluted console brackets, also with foliate carving and swags, which in turn support a hood cornice; diamond fielded spandrel panels complete the composition. The doors open onto a concrete-paved platform approached by three flights of concrete steps enclosed by steel railings, set within a terraced front lawn.

The asymmetrical south side elevation presents a series of projections, including an angled rectangular bay in the centre with a lead-lined flat roof and a full-height three-sided canted bay to the left, detailed as per the front elevation. The recessed section to the right has a tall red brick chimney stack with an angled vertical course above first-floor level, and to its right a red sandstone blank cartouche set in a red sandstone panel.

The rear (west) elevation has a series of rendered gable-ended returns and projections, including a red brick lift tower. To the right is a section three bays wide, detailed as the front elevation, with a central doorcase identical in design to those at the front, opening onto a concrete universal access ramp. The less formal rear elevation includes a variety of timber sash windows — 2/2, 6/2, and 4/2 lights — some retaining leaded stained glass, including those to the north staircase, which have elliptical-headed openings with 2/2 and 2/1 timber sash windows with margin lights.

The asymmetrical north side elevation has a full-height three-sided canted bay window matching the front elevation, a chimney stack, and a sandstone plaque, arranged as on the south side. A lower two-storey hipped lean-to abuts the west gable, with two square-headed openings: a 2/2 sliding sash window at first-floor level and a replacement timber door at ground floor, opening onto a concrete universal access ramp and steps.

Setting

The block sits on an elevated site at the western end of the Magee University Campus, adjacent to the Main Building, with terraced lawns to the front and sides. To the rear are two small tarmac yards enclosed by red brick walling with moulded terracotta coping. A single-storey red brick garage to the west retains three sheeted timber doors with glazed upper panels, one per original dwelling. The building fronts onto the main tarmac driveway through the campus. Despite the institutional appearance of the access ramps and lift shaft, the exterior remains well proportioned, and the brick yard enclosure and garage further enhance the quality of the setting. Almost identical buildings are located to the west. MC Block shares group value with a wealth of 19th-century structures dispersed throughout the campus that contribute significant interest to the Magee Conservation Area.