20 Main Street, Hillsborough, County Down, BT26 6AE

20 Main Street is a mid-terrace two-storey rendered former house built around 1830, located on the east side of Main Street in Hillsborough. The building is rectangular on plan and faces west. It has a pitched natural slate roof with black ridge tiles and a pair of rendered brick chimneystacks with clay pots. Cast-iron guttering on iron brackets runs along the rendered eaves course, with a cast-iron downpipe. The walling is painted with ruled and lined render and rusticated rendered quoins at either end.

The front west elevation is four windows wide and features square-headed window openings with painted masonry sills and replacement tripartite timber sash windows. An elliptical-headed carriage arch to the north bay provides access. A square-headed door opening with smooth rendered surround contains a replacement timber panelled and glazed door opening onto two granite steps to the street. Above the door is a replacement 6/6 timber sash window. The carriage arch itself contains a modern steel gate giving rear access.

The north side elevation is abutted by the adjoining building No. 18. A boarded soffit extends to the carriage arch, with painted rubblestone and brick wall exposed. The south side elevation is similarly abutted by the neighbouring building No. 22. To the rear, on the east elevation, there is an L-plan flat-roofed two-storey over basement extension with modern timber sash windows, concrete sills, and exposed sash boxes. Steel steps and a terrace supported on steel posts abut the extension.

The building was substantially altered during the mid-twentieth century when windows were widened and steel windows were inserted. More recently, the front elevation has been improved with the addition of painted sliding sash tri-partite windows. Although the majority of the building has been altered in ways that detract from its architectural character, the front elevation contributes positively to the Hillsborough Conservation Area.

The building now serves commercial use on the ground floor. The rear plot has been developed with a pair of two-storey rendered townhouses, built around 2007, accessed via the carriage arch.

Historically, the house was built on former wasteground owned by a Mr. Bradshaw. It appears on the first Ordnance Survey map for Hillsborough (dating from before 1833) but does not appear on a plan of the town dating from around 1800. The property is depicted on the Ordnance Survey and contemporary Townland Valuation map as a large square-shaped building with an oblong out office at the rear of its yard, most likely a coach house. The Townland Valuation records show that a Mr. Moses Tate occupied the house, which was valued at £12. By 1861, the house had been vacant for some time but was then occupied by George Macauley, a local merchant, who let it from the Marquis of Downshire. By this time the property's value had increased to £18. The rear out office had been extended to the back of the yard, with a number of small offices and houses noted in Griffith's Valuation. The house was recorded as a first-class dwelling measuring 13 yards by 8 yards and two storeys high. Macauley occupied the house until his death in 1878, after which his widow Isabella Macauley remained there until 1886. In 1890, William McCarthy purchased the house from the Marquis of Downshire and let it to Ms. Eliza Warren, who occupied it until 1896. James Magill, a Presbyterian grocer, ironmonger and oil merchant, then occupied the house, living there with his wife Sarah and three sons. The 1901 census building return recorded No. 20 as a first-class dwelling comprising 10 inhabited rooms and five out offices. Magill occupied the house until 1912 when it fell vacant again. Joshua Morrow occupied the house from 1914 until 1930. In 1974, the building was described as a four-bay two-storey house with coach arch, with ground floor and former three-light Georgian-glazed windows upstairs unhappily altered. The windows have since been restored with Georgian glazing. The building was listed in 1976. In 1994 the ground floor became a craft shop. The first floor was converted into an apartment in 2007, when the ground floor became a coffee shop. Since 2008 the ground floor has been used as a delicatessen. No original interior features remain as a result of these renovations.