2 De Burgh Terrace, Academy Road, Londonderry

No. 2 De Burgh Terrace is a late-Victorian mid-terraced townhouse built around 1889, situated on the north side of De Burgh Terrace within an elevated row of seventeen uniform houses. It fronts onto long sloping raised gardens and forms part of a cohesive group that is among the most important buildings within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area.

The house is two bays wide and two storeys tall with a wall-head dormer attic, built in a Georgian style using red brick in Flemish bond. It is rectangular on plan with a projecting rear return. The principal elevation faces south over the raised front garden, which is enclosed by a boundary wall of painted concrete block with precast concrete coping and a modern metal gate. The main roof is a slated pitched roof with bracketed eaves painted white.

On the principal (south) elevation, the ground floor features a canted bay with a sheet roof covering and square-headed painted 2/2 sliding sash windows with horizontally divided panes and ogee horns. The entrance doorway sits within a segmental arched opening with a moulded cornice supported by scrolled console brackets with acanthus leaf detail on pilasters; the door itself is a painted timber four-panelled type with a plain fanlight above. At first floor level there are segmental-headed painted 2/2 sliding sash windows, including coupled windows positioned above the bay and a single light above the doorcase. A continuous projecting sill course runs across the first floor. At the second floor, a wall-head dormer sits above the bay and contains a pair of round-headed painted 1/1 sliding sash windows, with decorative bargeboard, all painted white.

The east and west sides abut the adjoining listed houses, No. 1 and No. 3 De Burgh Terrace. The north (rear) elevation is rendered and includes a two-storey rear return with a door opening onto the rear yard. The main building has 2/2 horizontally split sliding sash windows to the ground and first floors, with replacement casement windows to the second floor and rear return. A wide gabled dormer with a modern casement window serves the attic level. The main roof and front dormer have pitched slate with clay ridge tiles. A large brick chimney stack rises from the east side, centred on the ridge and fitted with six clay pots. Cast-iron guttering and a circular downpipe serve the front elevation. To the rear there is a flat-roofed outbuilding incorporating an earlier stone wall. The rear yard is enclosed by rubble schist stone walling that defines the northern boundary, and is accessed from a rear lane. The local schist stone boundary walling, together with remaining schist stone walls separating the yards, enriches the quality of the setting.

The terrace is located immediately north-west of Londonderry city centre, on the western side of the River Foyle. De Burgh Terrace is reached from Academy Road, which runs between Rosemount Avenue to the north-west and Northland Road to the south-east. Brooke Park lies to the south-west. The seventeen houses share long front gardens and small rear yards, the latter accessed via an alleyway running the full length of the terrace.

The town plan of around 1873 records that De Burgh Terrace was originally laid out in the 1870s, though at that time the street was unnamed and had no buildings. Construction of the first houses did not begin until 1889. The terrace was part of the city's broader northward expansion. Following the establishment of Georgian-style terraces along Great James Street, Queen Street, and Clarendon Street during the 1830s to 1860s, Londonderry continued to grow northward to house its professional and merchant classes moving out of the Walled City. The walls of the Lunatic Asylum blocked direct northward expansion, so new terraces — including Crawford Square and De Burgh Terrace — were built to the north-west, on picturesque hill sites overlooking the Foyle. The development of large terraces around central gardens or squares has been described as the city's delayed response to Dublin's garden squares, creating a green oasis for wealthy residents near the city centre.

Following the laying out of Crawford Square in the 1860s to 1870s, Nos. 1–17 De Burgh Terrace were developed by Ulick James Daly, a civil servant and gentleman residing at Eccles Street in Dublin. He originally submitted plans for eighteen houses in 1888, but only seventeen were ever built. The terrace was constructed in stages between 1889 and 1894, with Nos. 1–8 being completed first. Annual Revisions confirm that Nos. 1–8 were built in 1889 and were individually valued at £14. The majority of the completed houses were leased by the Daly family. By the Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956–72), the value of No. 2 stood at £30, with the Daly family retaining ownership.

The first recorded occupant of No. 2 was a Mr James McLean. By 1901 the house had passed to Henry Campbell, a travelling Tea and Wine Merchant. The 1911 Census described Campbell's property as a first-class dwelling consisting of eleven rooms. Campbell remained at No. 2 until 1937. By 1941 the house was occupied by Mark B. Smith, also a Tea Merchant, whose family remained at the property until at least the 1970s.

Nos. 1–17 De Burgh Terrace were listed in 1979. De Burgh Terrace was not included in the original Clarendon Street Conservation Area designated in 1978, but in 2006 the area was extended primarily to incorporate the terrace, which has since been designated an area of special architectural or historic interest, the character of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance.

In 1988, No. 2 underwent an extensive renovation that included reslating of the roof, repointing of the exterior brickwork, and replacement of the sliding sash windows. Despite the loss of the original rear windows and the original four-panel doors, the exterior has retained its character, style, and proportion, making it a fine example of its period. The original plan form has been largely retained, although the removal of the four-panel doors has resulted in the loss of some historic fabric.