altinaghree Castle, Longloand Road, Donemana, Strabane BT82 0PN

Altinaghree Castle is the remains of a symmetrical three-storey, three-bay castellated country house built around 1865, situated on the north side of Longland Road to the east of Donemana village. The building is constructed of locally sourced rock-faced coursed schist with sandstone dressings. It is rectangular on plan with a four-storey tower and the remains of a return to the north. A porte-cochere projects to the east. The roof is entirely missing, though it was formerly concealed behind a castellated parapet. A string course runs at parapet level, and all corners are clasped by slightly projecting piers rising above parapet level and detailed with arrow and musket loops. All dressings are stone.

The windows are varied in character, featuring mullioned and transomed openings. Ground-floor windows are generally segmental-headed while upper floors are square-headed, except where otherwise detailed. Most windows have label mouldings and stone sills; no glazing remains. The south garden front is symmetrical and five openings wide. Above the central openings rises the four-storey tower, flanked by lesene strips rising above parapet level to form tower pinnacles. The central bay features oriels on corbelled bases to the second and fourth floors. The second-floor oriel has a decorative interlacing stone parapet detailed with quatrefoil apertures; the fourth-floor oriel base only survives. The west elevation is three windows wide with an oriel to the second floor and a roundel to the raised central section. A central segmental-headed door opening with bull-nosed stone step is placed here. This elevation extends at left by the remains of a two-storey return. The north elevation is abutted by the remains of the return at right and includes the four-storey tower in the re-entrant angle. At centre is a central depressed pointed-arched stairwell window opening with perpendicular tracery, rising almost the height of the building and lighting three flights of stairs. Remaining windows are irregularly arranged, and a pointed-arched-headed door opening with hood-mould stands to the left of the stairwell window. The tower bears a roundel date stone, partially illegible but appearing to show the date circa 1860. The return has only two walls remaining, with square-headed windows featuring label-moulds and chamfered surrounds. The east entrance front is three windows wide, symmetrically arranged about the central porte-cochere. The porte-cochere is roofless, with a depressed pointed-arched opening to each cheek and a pointed-arched rebated opening to the east face flanked by lancet niches. Ground-floor windows are segmental-headed with slender colonettes to the mullions. The first floor features oriels to either side and a central slender Venetian-style window supported on stone colonettes. The second floor has a bipartite round-headed window opening with central colonnette.

The house occupies an elevated site in open farmland with commanding views over the surrounding countryside. To the south is a small levelled, grassed area contained by a stone retaining wall. The house was formerly accessed from the east by a winding track, now open pasture, marked by a stone gate lodge and screen.

The entrance screen and gate lodge are constructed of rock-faced sandstone matching the main house. The entrance screen is castellated with a mock machicolation frieze over a Tudor-arched coach-arch; the reveal is ashlar stone with vermiculated springing stones. The screen is flanked by a tower at right and a two-storey lodge at left. The lodge has a shallow pitched corrugated metal roof and square-headed windows with label-moulds at each floor to east and west elevations (with remains of metal-framed windows). It is linked to the screen by a two-storey entrance bay with pointed-arched-headed door openings on each side surmounted by blank stone cartouches.

The demesne is bounded by a stone boundary wall. The remains of a walled garden lie to the east of the house, constructed of brick in stretcher bond with several camber-headed niches. A single remaining elliptical-arched entrance opening faces north.