5 Purdysburn Village, Ballycowan, Belfast, County Down, BT8 8LJ

Five Purdysburn Village is a Grade B2 listed building: a symmetrical one-and-a-half-storey mid-terrace cottage built around 1830, located in Purdysburn Village to the north of Ballycoan Road in Ballycowan, Belfast. The house forms the central building in a terrace of three cottages of similar style and detailing. It was formerly used as the village Post Office and grocers shop.

The building's roof is pitched natural slate with blue and black clay ridge tiles. It features deep overhanging eaves with exposed rafter ends and decorative painted bargeboards supported on exposed timber corbels. Two rectangular red brick gable chimneystacks each carry two tall decorative clay pots. The walling is smooth rendered. Rainwater goods are modern replacement uPVC u-profile.

Windows are painted lattice casements set within square-headed openings with plastered reveals and painted projecting masonry sills; replacement uPVC casement windows have been fitted at the rear. The principal north elevation is symmetrical, containing a central timber half-door sheathed vertically and surmounted by a natural slate pitched timber canopy supported on timber brackets. The entrance is flanked by a single window on each side. The first floor comprises two wall head dormers with pitched natural slate roofs and decorative painted bargeboards.

The east gable is abutted by the adjoining single-storey terrace block at No. 6 (HB19/23/024C). At the rear, a later single-storey extension with natural slate lean-to roof is detailed as the main house and contains a replacement uPVC window; this extension is flanked by replacement uPVC doors and abutted by a narrow single-storey boiler house with natural slate lean-to roof. The rear first floor contains two wall head dormers with replacement windows and plain timber bargeboards. The west gable is abutted by the adjacent single-storey block at No. 4 (HB19/23/024A).

The building retains many original features externally, including original lattice glazed windows at the north elevation, and remains largely unchanged from its original form and layout except for alterations and replacement windows and doors at the south elevation. Field research has found that the interior layout of the cottage remains substantially unchanged.

Purdysburn Village was established around 1830 to house servants and farm labourers for the adjoining Purdysburn Estate, which had been purchased by Narcissus Batt in 1811. The 1833 Ordnance Survey Memoirs recorded the village as a predominantly Protestant settlement with 125 persons, 120 of whom were Protestant. The 1844 Parliamentary Gazetteer noted that Purdysburn Village originally consisted of 28 single-storey cottages. By 1886, Bassett's County Down Directory described it as containing about 30 houses occupied chiefly by farm labourers, showing little alteration from earlier decades. The building first appears on the first edition Ordnance Survey map for the Parish of Drumbo in 1834, depicted as the central building in its terrace of three.

No. 5 was formerly recorded as the Post Office from 1877, when William Murray was noted as Postmaster and Grocer in the Ulster Town Directory. By 1880 the property had passed to John Martin. In 1901, Mary Hutchinson McAleese took over the Post Office, initially residing at No. 1 Purdysburn Village until 1908, after which she moved into the post office. The 1901 Census Building returns recorded it as a second-class shop and dwelling with six rooms and a store as its only outbuilding. Mary McAleese continued to reside at the post office until her death in April 1934. The building is now used solely as a private dwelling.

The terrace occupies a setting as part of Purdysburn Village, located to the north of Ballycoan Road. Vehicular access is at the east, with pedestrian access also possible at the south-east through an area of modern development. The house has a small enclosed garden at the south and a small paved forecourt at the north opening onto an area for shared parking. The building has significant group value as part of the estate terrace complex, standing alongside No. 4 (HB19/23/024A) and No. 6 (HB19/23/024C), as well as other estate terraces on the street (HB19/23/022 and HB19/23/023). Together these form an intact group that makes a significant contribution to the character of Purdysburn Village.