3 Queen St., Londonderry

No. 3 Queen Street is a Victorian mid-terrace townhouse of three storeys with an attic, built in 1847 on the west side of Queen Street, which runs between Great James Street and Clarendon Street on the west bank of the River Foyle. It forms part of a terrace of eight similar houses (Nos 1–8 Queen Street) and shares group value with them. The properties on either side — Nos 2 and 4 Queen Street — directly abut its north and south flanks. The building sits within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, whose character it significantly enhances through its historic authenticity.

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION

The house is rectangular on plan, with a two-bay principal elevation facing east and a single-storey projecting rear return to the west. The roof is pitched natural slate with terracotta clay ridge tiles. A rebuilt red brick chimney stack with clay pots rises from the south side of the main roof; a further rebuilt red brick chimney stack with seven terracotta clay pots also rises from the south side. Cast-iron half-round guttering is carried on iron drive-through brackets, terminating at a circular downpipe to the front elevation; uPVC rainwater goods serve the rear.

The principal (east) elevation is finished in smooth painted render. All window openings are square-headed, set on painted masonry sills. The ground-floor window bay is not aligned with the bays on the floors above, with a single window to the left of the entrance doorway. The entrance doorway has an elliptical arched head, is slightly recessed, and is flanked by engaged fluted Doric columns. It features a raised-and-fielded four-panel painted timber door beneath a classical entablature, with a webbed Adam-style fanlight above. The door opens directly onto the pavement threshold. First-floor windows are 6/6 timber sliding sashes; second-floor windows are 6/3 timber sliding sashes. Modern rooflights have been inserted into the front pitched slate roof.

The rear (west) elevation rises to three storeys and is finished in smooth unpainted cement render. The rear return is finished in smooth plain painted render, with red brick walling to its side elevations and a pitched slated roof. Window openings to the rear are square-headed on unpainted masonry sills, with an irregular fenestration pattern. Glazing to the rear and return is a mixture of timber sliding sashes and largely replacement timber and uPVC casement windows.

At the rear there is a small yard enclosed by a rendered wall, with the two-storey rear return forming part of its boundary.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Queen Street was originally laid out around 1840, with its first buildings constructed by at least 1847. Its development, along with that of the adjoining Great James Street and Clarendon Street, was driven by a remarkable period of population and economic growth in Londonderry during the mid-19th century. The historian John Hume records 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 the 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 few significant structures. At that date, the city's developed streets extended no further than Waterloo Place, Abbey Street, and William Street. In the early decades of the 19th century, the only substantial construction north of the city walls had been isolated institutional buildings — the Londonderry Infirmary, the Lunatic Asylum, and Foyle College — with virtually no domestic architecture in the area. The sole building predating the early-Victorian development in the immediate vicinity is Foyle Cottage, a Regency house constructed around 1815. Robert Simpson, writing in his Annals of Derry (1847), recorded that the district then covered by Great James Street, William Street, Little James Street and the surrounding lanes had originally comprised meadow ground without a single house.

Development of housing in this 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 affluent quarter that 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 town planning, and the development represented the most ambitious exercise in town planning in Londonderry since the construction of the walled city between 1613 and 1619.

O'Hagan's contemporary plan of Londonderry, published in 1847, recorded Queen Street under its original name of Queen's Street and noted that at least twelve houses had been built along the row by that date. The map confirms that Nos 1–8 Queen Street are among the earliest terraced dwellings within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area. No. 3 Queen Street appears on O'Hagan's 1847 plan, which also depicts a rear outbuilding that has since been demolished. The layout of Nos 1–8 Queen Street remained unchanged on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1853, with no further buildings added along the street in the intervening years.

Griffith's Valuation of 1856 records that Nos 1–8 Queen Street were leased to tenants by Thomas Major, a landowner residing in Creggan. No. 3 was valued at £17 and was occupied by a Mrs Catherine Woods, recorded in the Ulster Town Directories as a member of the nobility or gentry. Following Thomas Major's death in 1858, Nos 2–8 Queen Street continued to be administered by his estate into the 1930s. By the First General Revaluation of 1935, ownership of No. 3 had passed to a Mr James Mitchell, and the valuation of the dwelling had risen to £23. Both the owner and the valuation remained unchanged through the Second General Revaluation (1956–72).

In 1978, the Department of the Environment designated this group of mid-19th century streets and terraces as a Conservation Area, described as an area of special architectural or historic interest, the character of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance. Nos 1–8 Queen Street were subsequently listed in 1980.

RECORDED ALTERATIONS

The Northern Ireland Environment Agency's Historic Buildings records note that No. 3 Queen Street had its windows replaced with Georgian-style sashes in 1979, to bring it into line with the rest of the terrace. In 1984 its roof was reslated, and in 1994 the building was cleaned and general remedial work carried out. By the early 21st century, few of the mid-Victorian townhouses along Queen Street remained in residential use, the majority having been converted into offices for dental, legal, and accountancy practices during the latter part of the 20th century.

In 2013, Calley described Nos 1–8 Queen Street as the earliest buildings along the street, characterising them as smooth-rendered three-storey, two-bay properties with deep-set square-headed window bays and round-headed doorways, the second-storey bays being of diminished scale. He noted that the timber-framed doorways have Doric columns supporting dentilled entablatures and simple spider-web fanlights, that most retain their glazing bars — No. 3 retaining its Georgian-style sash windows — and that although their finishes have been altered over the years, they retain their large, deep chimneys.