Hillhall Presbyterian Church, 163 Hillhall Road, Lisburn, BT27 5JA

Hillhall Presbyterian Church

A free-standing, gable-fronted Arts and Crafts church built in 1902, set back within its own grounds to the north of Hillhall Road in Lisburn. The building is constructed of rough-cast lime rendered walling with Bath limestone ashlar detailing, arranged in a T-plan and facing south.

The church is topped by a pitched natural slate roof with horizontal bands of green slate, roll-moulded terracotta ridge tiles, and a lead-lined timber louvred ventilation lantern to the centre. Lead valleys and ogee-moulded cast-iron guttering with cast-iron downpipes run to a chamfered stone eaves course. A single rendered chimneystack with terracotta pots rises from the rear gable.

The principal south elevation is double-height and gabled, flanked by a square-plan three-stage tower to the east incorporating the entrance below and belfry above. Tapered buttresses in ashlar are flush to all gables and positioned between all window openings. The south gable features a raised stone coping with a decorative apex stone and diaper work below. The gable rises from corner piers with decorative capstones flanking a large semi-circular limestone window opening containing five cusped lancets with Art Nouveau leaded glazing resting on a splayed sill. At ground level, a central squat buttress with offset has cusped window openings to either side.

The square-plan tower has a pyramidal natural slate roof interrupted by four corner panelled stone piers with decorative capstones, surmounted by a lead pole and weather-vane. Sprocketed eaves extend beyond the corner piers, sheltering tripartite cusped stone belfry openings on all four sides, fitted with timber louvers and metal clock-faces to the south and east sides. At the base of the tower, a shallow lead-lined entrance gable is flanked by a buttress to the left and a plinth wall with offset to the right. The pointed-arched door opening is executed in limestone ashlar with stop-moulded jambs, archivolt, and hood moulding with decorative label stops. A pair of vertically-sheeted timber doors with iron furniture opens onto a semi-circular area of new stone paving.

The west elevation features a lozenge-shaped limestone window opening to the right. The nave has three groups of three cusped window openings arranged between tapering buttresses, all executed in tooled limestone with splayed flush sills and leaded glazing. The west transept gable incorporates a terracotta fleur-de-lis finial and flush tapered buttresses giving a battered profile, with an oculus opening and a five-light cusped stone window opening below featuring decorative naturalistic stained glass. The east elevation mirrors the west, with the tower positioned to the left.

The rear elevation is abutted by a single-storey multi-bay rendered church hall added in 2002, which has a natural slate roof, buttresses, and oculi designed to echo the Arts and Crafts elements of the original church.

The church sits on an elevated site with an expansive cemetery to the east containing numerous upstanding stone and marble grave-markers. A bitumac car park lies to the west. The property is enclosed to Hillhall Road by hedging, with the principal entrance directly facing the front elevation featuring replacement steel gates set on original sandstone piers that repeat the detail of the tower's corner piers. A two-storey manse stands to the west.