1 Queen Street, Londonderry, BT48 7EG

1 Queen Street, Londonderry

This is an early Victorian end-of-terrace townhouse, built around 1847, forming part of a uniform terrace of eight similar properties (numbers 1–8 Queen Street). It is a three-storey, two-bay building, sited perpendicular to the street, with its principal elevation facing east onto Queen Street and its south elevation facing onto Great James Street. The building retains much of its original historic fabric and character, with only minor internal alterations. It is a good example of the Georgian-style terrace, robust in its simplicity, and is significant both architecturally and historically as part of the development of Londonderry beyond the City Walls during the period 1825–1850.

Architectural Description

The roof is pitched and clad in natural slate with clay ridge tiles. A large red brick chimney stack with seven terracotta pots rises from the south gable end. Cast-iron half-round guttering is supported on cast-iron rise-and-fall brackets projecting from the eaves. The walls are smooth-rendered and painted, with deep-set square-headed window bays.

The front entrance on the east elevation features a painted four-panelled timber door with brass ironmongery, flanked by fluted Doric columns supporting a dentilled entablature and a three-centred arched fanlight. Windows on the ground and first floors of the east elevation are six-over-six painted timber sliding sash, with wrought-iron railings at ground floor level; the second floor windows are six-over-three painted timber sliding sash. The north elevation abuts the adjoining number 2 Queen Street. The south elevation has a single six-over-six painted timber sliding sash window at first floor level and two small casement windows at attic level. The west elevation has irregular fenestration, comprising a mix of six-over-six, six-over-three, and three-over-three painted timber sliding sash windows.

To the rear there is a two-storey return, with a small yard enclosed by a boundary wall and a gate providing access onto Great James Street.

Setting

The building sits at the junction of Great James Street and Queen Street, facing east, with its flank yard wall facing south onto Great James Street.

Historical Context

Queen Street was originally laid out around 1840, with buildings under construction by at least 1847. Its development — along with the adjoining Great James Street and Clarendon Street — was driven by significant economic and population growth in Londonderry during the mid-19th century. The historian John Hume has noted that during the period 1825–1850, the reconstruction of buildings within the city walls took place alongside the first development of housing outside the walls at Bogside and Edenballymore. Queen Street was the second major new street in this area, following Great James Street, which had been laid out around 1833.

The first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1830 for the townland of Edenballymore shows the Queen Street area as rural hinterland, with the city's streets at that time extending no further north than Waterloo Place, Abbey Street, and William Street. In the early decades of the 19th century, the only significant construction north of the walls had been isolated institutional buildings — the Londonderry Infirmary, the Lunatic Asylum, and Foyle College — with almost no domestic architecture in the same period. The only building in the area predating the early Victorian development is Foyle Cottage, a Regency house built around 1815. Robert Simpson, in his Annals of Derry (published 1847), recorded that the entire district now covered by Great James Street, William Street, Little James Street, and the surrounding lanes had originally been meadow ground without a single house.

Development in this area began in the late Georgian period and continued into the Victorian era. Uniform rows of three-storey townhouses created a new affluent quarter that quickly became the preferred residence of the city's merchant and professional classes. The geometric street pattern of Clarendon Street, Great James Street, and Queen Street was characteristic of Georgian urban planning and represented the most ambitious town planning project in Londonderry since the construction of the walled city between 1613 and 1619.

O'Hagan's contemporary plan of Londonderry (1847) recorded the street as originally named Queen's Street and noted that at least twelve houses had been built along the row by that date. Numbers 1–8 and 9–12 Queen Street are among the earliest terraced dwellings within what is now the Clarendon Street Conservation Area. Number 1 appears on O'Hagan's 1847 plan with a rear outbuilding, now demolished. By the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1853, the layout of numbers 1–8 had not changed, and no further buildings had been added along the street in the intervening years.

Griffith's Valuation of 1856 records that numbers 1–8 Queen Street were leased to tenants by Thomas Major, a landowner resident in Creggan. Number 1 was valued at £17 and occupied by a Miss Sarah Denham, recorded in the Ulster Town Directories as a member of the gentry — possibly a relative of the Reverend James Denham of Londonderry Third Presbyterian Church. Despite Thomas Major's death in 1858, numbers 2–8 continued to be administered by his estate until the cancellation of the Annual Revisions in 1931. In 1923, however, ownership of number 1 reverted to The Honourable The Irish Society when a Mr James Mitchell took possession. By the end of the Annual Revisions, the valuation of number 1 had risen to £19. Under the First Revaluation of 1935, the value increased to £21, and under the Second Revaluation covering 1956–1972, it rose again to £23, with number 1 remaining in the ownership of James Mitchell into the 1970s.

In 1970, the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society recommended that Queen Street and the adjoining streets be incorporated into a comprehensive conservation area. In 1978, the Department of the Environment designated the mid-19th century streets and terraces as a Conservation Area, described as an area of special architectural or historic interest whose character it is desirable to preserve or enhance. The group of terraces at numbers 1–8 Queen Street was subsequently listed in 1980.

Alterations and Later History

NIEA Historic Buildings records note that the property was renovated in 1984, when its rainwater goods were replaced with appropriate cast-iron substitutes, the roof was reslated, and general interior repairs were carried out. The former dwelling was converted into offices in 1994, with associated conversion works undertaken at that time. The building is currently used as a dentist's clinic, as is the case with the majority of the three-storey townhouses along Queen Street, most of which were converted into offices for dentists, solicitors, and accountancy firms during the late 20th century.

In 2013, Calley described numbers 1–8 Queen Street as the earliest buildings along the street, noting that they are smooth-rendered, three-storey and two-bay, with deep-set square-headed window bays and round-headed doorways, diminished in scale at second-storey level. He observed that the timber-framed doorways have Doric columns supporting dentilled entablatures and simple spider-web fanlights, that most retain their glazing bars — with number 1 possessing Georgian-style sash windows — and that although their finishes have been altered over the years, the buildings retain their large, deep chimneys.

Number 1 Queen Street has group value as part of the terrace of eight similar houses at numbers 1–8 Queen Street.