22 Curly Hill Road, Strabane, Co Tyrone BT82 8LP

This is a detached, multi-bay, two-storey rendered house with attic storey, built around 1880, situated on the north side of Curly Hill Road in Strabane, County Tyrone. The property includes an attached gate-screen and a lower two-storey outbuilding to the west, and fronts directly onto the road facing south. It is known historically as Hollymount.

The house has a pitched natural slate roof with black clay ridge tiles, several rendered and profiled chimneystacks with clay pots, and cast-iron rainwater goods. The walls are finished in rough-cast render with a smooth render plinth course. Window openings are square-headed with rendered reveals, concrete sills, and two-over-two timber sash windows throughout. The principal south-facing elevation is four bays wide, with the eaves set unusually high over the first-floor windows. The entrance sits in the right-hand bay, and to the left is a curved corner bay corresponding to the curved wing of the adjacent gate-screen. The entrance has a replacement timber panelled door with a rectangular overlight above, and the remains of a red brick porch survive — a small red brick wall indicates where an earlier front entrance porch once stood. Where the porch formerly opened, there is now a single-pane timber sash window with coloured margin lights. On the west gable at attic level there is a glazed timber door that opens onto a cantilevered concrete platform. The curved corner bay continues outward as a rubblestone screen wall forming part of the gate-screen.

At the rear, the building is abutted by a two-storey rough-cast rendered return with a pitched natural slate roof, two rendered profiled chimneystacks with clay pots, and cast-iron rainwater goods. The windows on the return are square-headed with rendered reveals and two-over-two timber sash windows. There is also a small square-headed window opening at attic level on the gable. On the east gable are a pair of diminutive window openings fitted with two-pane timber casement windows, and a tall rubble stone wall abuts this gable.

The gate-screen consists of an elliptical-headed carriage arch formed in red brick, fitted with a pair of tongue-and-groove timber gates. The arch is flanked by a pair of curved rubblestone wings that extend to connect both the main house and the adjoining road-fronting outbuilding. The wall connecting to the house incorporates a crow-step detail and a pedestrian entrance formed in red brick with a tongue-and-groove timber door.

The two-storey outbuilding to the west is finished in the same manner as the main house, with a curved corner bay to its right. The first-floor windows have tongue-and-groove shutters, and the ground-floor openings are of concrete block. To the east gable of the main house, the tall rubblestone wall continues along the road and encloses a yard to the north, accessed through a corrugated iron gate. This enclosed yard is bounded on the west by the rear return of the main house, on the east by the remains of large stone arches — possibly the remains of earlier outbuildings associated with Curly Hill Estate, which sits opposite — and on the north by a large two-storey rubble outbuilding with a Belfast roof. The current owner has advised that her father constructed this roof during the mid-20th century. To the north of the enclosed yard lies an attractive mature garden and a small orchard, and beyond that an extensive rural landscape to the north-west, bounded on all sides by dry stone walling.

The history of the site is well documented through surviving valuation records. Outbuildings are shown on the site of the present house on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1833. A building directly opposite is captioned 'Curly Hill', and on the second edition the building on this site appears to be included within that designation. However, valuation maps from 1833 onwards assign the two properties separate plot numbers, indicating they were separately owned. By the third and fourth editions of the Ordnance Survey (1905 and 1951), the current house is present and captioned 'Hollymount'.

The Townland Valuation of 1828 to 1840 records a farmyard and outbuildings on the site, occupied by a Mr Samuel Colhoun and valued at £5. Griffith's Valuation of 1856 to 1864 describes the property as a 'Caretaker's house and offices', later amended to a 'Gate lodge and offices', suggesting the property formed part of a larger estate, most likely Curly Hill Estate. The lessors at that time were Geo Smiley, Andrew Spotswood, and Connolly Lisky, and the valuation was £4, later raised to £5. By 1869 the reference to a gate lodge had been deleted and the buildings were described simply as 'offices'. In 1880 a William Hunter added a house and shop to the plot, raising the valuation to £15 — it is likely that the present house dates from this addition. Buildings to the rear were separately described as a house and offices, valued at £1 10s and 10s respectively. A new outbuilding was added in 1915, increasing the valuation to £2. Valuers' notes from this period include a plan of the house and outbuildings, describe the construction as rubble masonry and felt, and characterise the outbuildings as 'purely agricultural'. By 1918, Robert Gormley is recorded as the occupier in fee, and the buildings subsequently remained in Gormley family ownership, though leased to other occupiers.

In 1934 the main house was occupied by John George McGinnis and leased from Daniel Doherty. It was valued at £6 10s, later raised to £10 10s, and comprised a kitchen, a room, and five bedrooms, with dimensions recorded for a porch, the main house, the return, and the attic. Following an appeal in 1935, the valuer confirmed that part of the premises was still in use as a shop. By 1941 the house was occupied by R A Hale, leased from Judge Smyly, and described as 'unfinished'. The valuer noted: "House being reconstructed but work held up indefinitely due to lack of materials. Partly completed and occupied are one kitchen, room used as office, two bedrooms and bathroom. Other rooms are unplastered, not floored or otherwise unuseable." By 1943 the house was described as almost finished: "Although not quite finished internally the house is now in a good habitable state. Contains the following accommodation: ground floor: hall, office, sitting room, kitchen, scullery. First floor: two good bedrooms, bathroom. Adjoining part of house contains workshop on ground floor with two rooms over (not finished). Fair attics over whole building." The valuation was subsequently raised to £28, with £4 5s for outbuildings. In 1944, during an appeal, Richard Hale stated he had spent £150 to £200 on interior fittings and decoration. The valuer observed at that time: "This is an old house which the present occupier has attempted to remodel and improve, without, in my opinion, very much success….The situation of this house is very bad. Approach is by a steep and narrow street with a very bad surface past poor working class houses. Furthermore it is right out on the road without any garden, without even a forecourt to give a slight degree of privacy."

In 1934 the buildings to the rear of the main house were in use as a slaughterhouse, leased by Daniel Doherty from Judge Smyly, with a lease dating from 1817. The dwelling element was valued at £2 (reduced from £5 5s following a 1935 appeal) and the slaughterhouse at £4 5s. Two further dwellings are also recorded on the plot. A 'small kitchen type of house' adjoining the main house to the west was leased after 1934 by Charles Campbell from Daniel Doherty, valued at £4 5s, and comprised a kitchen, two upstairs rooms, and a W.C. in the yard; no separate entrance to this dwelling is visible on the front elevation today. A further house to the west of the main house, on the other side of the entrance gateway, had numerous changes of tenant and was leased from Daniel Doherty in 1934 and from R A Hale thereafter. It was valued at £3 15s (raised from £2 15s), comprised a kitchen and one room with a loft upstairs, had an earth closet, and was built of rubble, brick, and slate. The valuer described it as a 'kitchen type of house'.

Whilst the group of buildings forms an interesting complex of local character — a late 19th-century rural house of modest and informal proportions, set on a roadside plot with an extensive mature site to the north-east, and possibly incorporating fabric from the original outbuildings of Curly Hill Estate — the buildings were assessed as not being of sufficient interest to warrant listing.