8 Glenchiel Road, Plumbridge, Co Tyrone, BT79 8LN

A detached two-bay two-storey direct-entry vernacular dwelling built around 1850, located on the south side of Glenchiel Road near Plumbridge. The building is rectangular in plan with a single-storey lean-to porch to the south, a two-storey outshot to the north (an unusual feature in such buildings), and an attached single-bay two-storey byre to the west.

The roof is pitched natural slate, largely replaced by artificial slates, with blue and black clay ridge tiles over a stone eaves course, cement verges, and smooth rendered chimney-stacks. The walls are lime-rendered rubble with fieldstone quoins over a rendered plinth. Windows are square-headed timber-framed 3/3 sliding sashes with exposed sash boxes, stone sills at ground floor level and concrete sills at first floor level.

The principal elevation faces south, with each bay containing a single window at each floor. The left bay is abutted on its left by the porch, which contains a vertically-sheeted timber entrance door. The attached byre contains square-headed openings at each floor and is abutted at ground floor by a stone stair over the porch, providing access to the first floor. A door opening at first floor level is located in the north elevation of the byre. The west gable is abutted by the byre and is otherwise blank, further abutted by single-storey outbuildings. The north elevation is abutted by the outshot containing a single window at ground floor; the exposed section at left contains a single window at ground floor, while the exposed section at right is blank. The east gable is abutted by a single-storey outbuilding of circa 1930, with the exposed section being blank.

The building is set within a farmyard with access from the road via a northerly lane bounded by a farm gate. Attached single-storey outbuildings to the west are of rubble construction with pitched corrugated metal roofs. An attached single-storey outbuilding to the east has rendered walling with a pitched corrugated metal roof and metal casement windows.

Historical records indicate that a dwelling on this site appears on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1853. Griffith's Valuation of 1856-64 lists a house, offices and land occupied by John McGarvey, valued at £1 5 shillings, and leased from W.H. Ashe and Robert Stevenson. In 1872 the lessors became the Representatives of William H. Ashe and Hamilton Thompson. By 1910 the occupier was James McGarvey, and by 1933 James McGarvey had become the owner in fee under land purchase legislation of the early twentieth century. At that time the house comprised a kitchen, room and pantry on the ground floor and two bedrooms on the first floor, with the building valued at £1 15 shillings and the outbuildings at 10 shillings. Map evidence and field inspection suggest the building has undergone a number of changes. It is possible that the house was originally a single-storey dwelling that was subsequently raised, with a byre incorporated at the west end and further extension to the east adding another bay, this latter change dating to circa 1930. Windows to the rear suggest a possible original date of circa 1850 as a single-storey dwelling.

Although an interesting nineteenth-century two-storey byre dwelling, the loss of original fabric and detailing detracts from its character and it does not meet the criteria for listing.