3 Bayview Terrace, Asylum Road, Londonderry

No. 3 Bayview Terrace is a mid-Victorian mid-terraced house of three storeys with an attic, built in 1870 to an architect unknown. It forms part of a uniform terrace of seven similar houses (Nos 1–7 Bayview Terrace) lining the south side of Asylum Road, on the western side of the River Foyle within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area. The building is currently in use as the Bayview Medical Centre, having previously served as a private dwelling and later as self-contained apartments.

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION

The house is rectangular in plan, facing north, with rendered banded rustication to the ground floor of the front elevation, a rendered plinth, and smooth rendered painted finish to the upper floors. A continuous painted sill course runs across the full width of the first-floor windows. Window openings are square-headed with moulded architrave surrounds and contain one-over-one double-hung timber sliding sash windows with moulded horns. On the ground floor, two window bays sit to the right of a recessed elliptical arched door opening, reached by six steps up. The doorcase is particularly fine: it is framed by rendered square pilasters and entablature above, with a plain fanlight, a timber two-panel door, moulded square pilasters of the Doric order, and a moulded entablature with acanthus leaf detail to the crown moulding. Three window openings are set to each of the first and second floors, centred above the front door and ground-floor windows.

The pitched natural slate roof has two small dormers, one to the front and one to the rear. The front dormer is centrally placed on the main roof, has slated cheeks, and contains a semicircular one-over-one timber sliding sash window set within a timber fascia. A two-stage rendered and brick chimney stack with terracotta clay pots rises from the west side, centred on the ridge. The roof has a timber fascia and slightly overhanging timber soffit, with moulded uPVC guttering discharging to a uPVC circular downpipe on the north elevation.

The rear elevation (south) is of painted brick with square-headed window openings containing a single one-over-one timber sliding sash window at ground-floor level, though the view of this elevation is significantly restricted by a large external metal staircase abutting it within a confined rear yard. A three-storey rendered return abuts the rear elevation and has a pitched slate roof with black ridge tiles and cast-iron and uPVC rainwater goods. A metal external staircase abuts the west side of the return and contains a uPVC door at ground-floor level opening onto the rear yard, along with a single timber casement and a single uPVC casement window to the right of the door opening. There is a single six-over-six timber sliding sash window on both the first and second floors of the return. The south elevation of the rear return is abutted by an adjoining rendered unpainted outbuilding, which replaces the original outbuilding that was demolished and rebuilt. This outbuilding extends to the rear of the site; its south elevation has uPVC casement windows — two on the ground floor with metal mesh grilles, and three evenly spaced windows on both the first and second floors — plus a small square-headed opening to the left of the ground-floor windows, fitted with a metal-sheeted door that provides access to the rear yard of No. 2 Bayview Terrace. The west side of the building is abutted by No. 2 Bayview Terrace and the east side by No. 4 Bayview Terrace.

INTERIOR

Despite alterations to the original floor plan, some historic internal detailing survives. The building was originally recorded in the 1911 Census as a first-class dwelling consisting of ten rooms.

SETTING

The house sits on the south side of Asylum Road behind a rebuilt rendered wall with steel railings above; part of the original stone plinth wall remains to the front boundary. The main entrance is approached by a short flight of concrete steps or a newly built ramp. No. 3 is set within a row of seven houses of similar type and style, all facing north within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, and carries group value as part of that terrace.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Asylum Road runs between the Strand and Northland Roads and predates the surrounding streets, having existed before 1830. It formed the southern boundary of the Londonderry District Lunatic Asylum, built between 1825 and 1829. The asylum was demolished in the 1960s, though the perimeter wall of locally quarried Derry Schist still stands opposite the terrace, marking the institution's original boundary. No buildings had been erected along Asylum Road by 1853, according to the second edition Ordnance Survey map. The first houses on the road, Nos 1–13 Asylum Road at the top of the hill, were constructed around 1860, contemporaneously with the Georgian-style terraces along Queen and Clarendon Street. Nos 1–7 Bayview Terrace followed a decade later and display a more Victorian character than those Georgian-style neighbours, with ornate features such as Doric door frames and entablatures; Nos 1, 4, and 7 Bayview Terrace also possess bay windows with entablatures bearing fretwork frieze decorations. The terrace was named Bayview on account of its proximity to the River Foyle, which originally afforded a scenic view over Rosses Bay; subsequent land reclamation and construction on the eastern side of the Strand Road has since removed that prospect.

The terrace was first recorded in the Annual Revisions in 1870 and first depicted on the Annual Revisions Plan of Londonderry of around 1873. It was built on land owned by Harvey Nicholson, a local magistrate and Justice of the Peace. No. 3 was originally valued at £45, with Matthew McClelland — a local magistrate and builder who resided at No. 1 Bayview Terrace — recorded as landlord. The McClelland family retained the landlordship of No. 3 until at least the 1970s. The first recorded occupant was a Mr Richard Williamson. By 1901 the house was occupied by Samuel Fletcher, a local publican and wine merchant, and by 1911 by Mrs Maria Rutledge. The First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57) records the house as occupied in 1940 by Dr S. Ernest Bolton, who remained there through the Second Revaluation (1956–72), during which the value was slightly reduced from £45 to £43. As with the neighbouring streets, the townhouses of Bayview Terrace served as residences for Londonderry's professional and merchant classes.

In 1978 the Department of the Environment designated Bayview Terrace and its surrounding streets a Conservation Area. No. 3 was subsequently listed in 1979. In 1988 the building was converted into self-contained apartments; that conversion included the reconstruction of the original chimney stack and the reslating of the roof. The building is now in use as Bayview Medical Centre.