145-147 Ballyskeagh Road, Drumbeg, Lisburn, County Down, BT17 9LL

A pair of symmetrical one-and-a-half-storey brick semi-detached labourer's houses built in 1884, located north of Ballyskeagh Road in Drumbeg. Each house is rectangular on plan, aligned north-south.

The houses are constructed of stretcher-bond red brick with pitched natural slate roofs, featuring blue and black clay ridge tiles. Central red brick corbelled chimneystack with four circular clay pots rises prominently. The eaves are projecting and supported on exposed timber rafter ends, with plainly detailed timber bargeboards. Rainwater goods are modern replacement u-profile uPVC.

The principal south-facing elevation is symmetrical, with a vertically sheeted timber door with transom light at right and left, and two square-headed 1/1 timber sliding sash windows with painted reveals at centre. The west gable contains a replacement window at ground floor and two diminished round-arched headed 1/1 timber sliding sash windows at first floor. The upper level space is accessed via ladder, which would historically have been shared between the two properties on the basis of family size. The north (rear) elevation is abutted by a single-storey flat-roof extension built around 1960.

A full-height curved brick boundary wall encloses the rear yard. The small south-facing garden is enclosed by a brick plinth wall and railings supported by brick piers. The Ordnance Survey maps indicate that the original rear returns were narrower than those currently existing.

The valuation revision books record that the pair was erected in 1884, presumably as agricultural labourers' dwellings, apparently constructed by the Stewart family, who owned the public house immediately to the east. The eastern cottage is now used as a taxi office. Modern additions to the rear elevation have detracted from the original scale, but the principal south elevation retains significant architectural character. Formally planned labourer's dwellings of this period are now relatively rare, and this pair remains a well-preserved example of the genre.