47 Clarendon St., Londonderry

47 Clarendon Street, Londonderry

This is an early Victorian mid-terrace townhouse built in 1862, forming part of a continuous row of Georgian-style brick terraces lining the south side of Clarendon Street. It was constructed at the same time as Nos. 29–45 and 49–51, and forms part of a broader group with Nos. 5–45 and 49–73 (excluding No. 53) that were built over a twenty-one year period. The house sits within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area.

Architectural Description

The building is two bays wide, three storeys tall with an attic, and rectangular on plan with a projecting rear return. The principal elevation faces north onto Clarendon Street and is set behind a concrete block wall with a crenellated top. The walling is red brick laid in Flemish bond on a painted rendered plinth base.

The roof is pitched and slated, with a single dormer to the front. A large brick chimney stack rises from the east side, centred on the ridge, and carries six clay pots and one replacement terracotta pot. The main roof has terracotta ridge tiles; the front dormer has black clay ridge tiles. Cast-iron guttering and a circular downpipe serve the front elevation; uPVC rainwater goods have been fitted to the rear.

Windows throughout are 6/6 timber sliding sash in square-headed openings on the ground, first, and second floors of the front elevation, with two windows at each level. The original windows have been altered to include glazing bars with replacement panes. The entrance doorway has an elliptical arched opening with a moulded cornice supported on scrolled corbel brackets with acanthus leaf detail, set on moulded pilasters. Above the painted timber door is a plain fanlight.

The south elevation is three storeys, cement rendered, with a three-storey rear return and a door opening onto the rear yard. The fenestration on this side is irregular: 6/6 sliding sash windows survive at ground and second floor levels, while the remaining floors throughout, including the return, have replacement casement windows. A single-storey cement-rendered extension to the rear return also has replacement casement windows. uPVC rainwater goods are fitted to the south side.

The east and west sides abut the adjoining Nos. 45 and 49 Clarendon Street respectively.

Interior

The original plan form has been lost due to internal alterations, and some historic fabric — including fireplaces and internal doors — has been removed. A renovation in 1979 included the repointing of the brickwork and the installation of new floors throughout, following an extensive outbreak of rot. Despite these losses, much of the external historic detailing survives.

Historical Context

Clarendon Street was laid out in the early Victorian period as part of a significant expansion of the city beyond its walled centre. The area, historically part of the townland of Edenballymore, was recorded as rural hinterland with few structures on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1830. At that date, the city's built-up streets extended no further than Waterloo Place, Abbey Street, and William Street. The only major construction north of the walls in the early 19th century had consisted of isolated institutional buildings: the Londonderry Infirmary, the Lunatic Asylum, and Foyle College. As Robert Simpson noted in his Annals of Derry (1847), the district that would become Great James Street, William Street, and Little James Street had previously been meadow ground without a house.

The initial development of housing in the area began in the late Georgian period and continued into the Victorian era. The construction of uniform rows of three-storey townhouses established a new and prosperous quarter that became the preferred address 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 town planning and represented the most ambitious planning exercise in Londonderry since the construction of the walled city between 1613 and 1619.

A plan of Londonderry dated 1847 depicted the proposed layout of Clarendon Street at least a decade before it was fully completed, and recorded that it was originally known as Ponsonby Street, named after the Right Reverend Richard Ponsonby (1772–1853), Bishop of Derry and Raphoe. By the 1850s it had been renamed Clarendon Street in honour of George Villiers, Fourth Earl of Clarendon (1800–1870), Lord Lieutenant of Ireland between 1847 and 1852. The second edition Ordnance Survey map confirms that the renaming had occurred by at least 1853.

Although the 1847 plan showed Clarendon Street extending from the quay up to Francis Street, only the lower section between the Strand Road and Queen Street had been laid out by 1853. Development progressed slowly through the 1850s. In 1851, Skipton and Miller had advertised building ground on Clarendon Street, Queen Street, and Patrick Street to let in perpetuity. Griffith's Valuation recorded only nine dwellings along the entire length of the street by 1856, and in that year additional leases were advertised for building ground on the northern side of the street.

Nos. 29–51 Clarendon Street were constructed in 1862 as part of the second phase of the street's development. No. 47, together with the adjoining Nos. 41–51, was built for James Corscaden, a grain merchant with business premises on Shipquay Place. The house was originally valued at £28 in 1862. Its first occupant was the Reverend Reid Bailie, curate to Christ Church. The 1901 census building return described No. 47 as a first-class dwelling comprising ten rooms. Corscaden continued to own Nos. 45–51 until 1913, when Dr. David J. Browne, chief medical officer at Londonderry's workhouse, purchased the row. Dr. Browne's widow, Margaret Browne, retained ownership of the four buildings until the 1970s. The First General Revaluation of 1935 set the property's value at £35, which was raised to £37 under the Second General Revaluation of 1956–72.

In 1978 the Department of the Environment designated Clarendon Street and the surrounding streets a Conservation Area, defined as an area of special architectural or historic interest the character of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance. No. 47 was listed in 1979. The roof was reslated in 1982, and by 1988 the building had been converted to office use with a dental surgery on the ground floor. At the time of the second survey it was in use as a solicitor's office. Few of the mid-Victorian townhouses along Clarendon Street are now in residential use; most were converted to offices for local professional practices during the late 20th century.

Setting

The house is one of twelve mid-Victorian townhouses forming a continuous terrace on the south side of Clarendon Street, within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area. The well-preserved setting of the street as a whole adds to the interest of the individual building. As noted by architectural historian Calley in 2013, Nos. 41–51 are three-and-a-half-storey, two-bay terrace houses which, unlike those on the opposite side of the street, have an extra window bay at ground floor level, roof dormers facing the street, and entablatures supported by scrolled brackets rather than Doric columns. The only building in the immediate area predating the early Victorian development is Foyle Cottage, a Regency house constructed around 1815, which Calley describes as a pleasing composition that opens a gap in the long terraces.