5 The Square, Hillsborough, Co. Down, BT26 6AG

5 The Square, Hillsborough

An end of terrace two-storey rendered building, built around 1850, now a café but formerly a house and public house. The building is rectangular on plan with a two-storey rendered return and a series of attached two-storey extensions. It is roofed in natural slate with clay ridge tiles and two redbrick chimneystacks. Cast-iron guttering and downpipes are mounted on iron brackets.

The front elevation is rendered with a smooth render plinth course. It is three windows wide with square-headed window openings throughout. The first floor has replacement tripartite timber sash windows with painted masonry sills. The ground floor contains a pair of symmetrical shopfronts with modern fascia signs, fixed-pane timber display windows, and central square-headed door openings with replacement timber panelled and glazed doors and overlights accessing concrete steps to the street. The north side gable is blank, with rear access running between the gable and the boundary wall to Hillsborough Fort. The rear elevation is abutted by a two-storey return and two-storey lean-to extension, with a single tripartite timber sash window. The north elevation of the return has three 6/6 timber sash windows to the first floor and a door opening accessed by steel steps. The south elevation is abutted by the adjoining building No. 6.

The building terminates a terrace of three houses on the north end of The Square, facing west on the east side overlooking the former Market House. The long narrow rear plot is partly occupied by two two-storey rendered extensions attached to the return, with the remainder given over to car parking.

Historical records indicate the building underwent successive phases of rebuilding and remodelling. No buildings are shown on this side of The Square on an estate map of 1777, but by 1788 a row of houses is schematically represented, shown in more detail on a map of circa 1800. The house occupying the site was then the residence of 'Renyson'. Initially comprising two separate dwellings, the Townland Valuation (1828-40) lists a smaller structure to the north as a house and yard valued at £4.18s, occupied by William Blythe, and a larger building with substantial return to the south as a house, office and yard occupied by Henry Biggs. By Griffith's Valuation (1856-64), though occupying substantially the same plan, both buildings appear to have been remodelled or rebuilt with substantially increased valuations. The larger property was then a public house with office, yard and small garden, occupied by Joseph Lavery and leased from Thomas McIleary, valued at £16.15s, later raised to £17. The smaller property, occupied by William Walker and later vacant, was valued at £6.5s, later raised to £6.10s, with a note that the premises had formerly been a shop, though unclear in the record.

In 1873 the two properties were consolidated into one, occupied by Joseph Gibson with a valuation initially of £25, later reduced to £20. In 1886 the valuation was reduced again as the property was in bad repair. By 1891 it was again noted as a public house, with Ellen Gibson becoming proprietor in 1901. A succession of tenants followed: John Huston in 1922, Thomas Patterson in 1925, and the McClughan family from 1926, who also occupied other properties in The Square.

An early survey photograph shows large steel picture windows had been installed in the front elevation, subsequently replaced with the current tripartite type, more in keeping with the Conservation Area. The building later reverted to living accommodation, becoming offices in the 1980s, then an antique shop. In 1990 a request was made to use it as an ice cream parlour.

The front elevation was substantially degraded by the 1960s, and subsequent changes have resulted in the removal of most of its historic fabric, detailing and layout. The building contributes to the Hillsborough Conservation Area but does not meet the test as a building of special architectural or historical interest for listing purposes.