Shamrock Vale, 233 Hillsborough Road, Lisburn, Co. Down, BT27 5RJ

Shamrock Vale is a detached villa-style house built around 1830, set to the east of Hillsborough Road within its own landscaped grounds in the townland of Magherageery, north of Hillsborough. It is one of a number of former gentlemen's houses along this stretch of road, alongside Eglantine House and Wellington Lodge. The house was extensively renovated and remodelled around 1995, resulting in significant loss of original fabric to both the interior and exterior and changes to the internal layout, floors, and ceiling heights. Despite this, it retains its overall composition and external character, and its original outbuildings survive to the north.

PLAN AND FORM

The house is U-shaped on plan, facing west, with a sunken courtyard to the north. The principal west front elevation is single-storey over basement, four bays wide. The south side elevation is two storeys, also four windows wide, and is the most distinctive face of the building. The east rear elevation is irregular, with the lawn embanked to basement level.

ROOF AND EXTERNAL MATERIALS

The roofs are hipped and covered in natural slate, re-roofed around 1980, with terracotta ridge tiles. The two bowed bays on the south elevation have curved roofs with lead ridges. There are four rendered chimneystacks, each carrying four painted octagonal clay pots. Replacement moulded metal guttering is fixed on shaped iron brackets to a rendered eaves course, and replacement cast-iron downpipes are fitted throughout. The walls are finished in painted ruled and lined cement render with rusticated rendered quoins and a projecting rendered plinth course.

WEST FRONT ELEVATION

The principal entrance elevation is single-storey, four bays wide, with an off-centre three-centred arched door opening containing a replacement timber doorcase. The door itself is timber panelled and is flanked by a pair of sidelights, with a stepped lintel cornice and fanlight over. It opens onto an elevated granite platform reached by four granite steps from a bitmac front area. An early wrought-iron bootscraper is fixed to one of the steps. Window openings throughout are square-headed with painted stone sills and replacement 6/6 timber sash windows.

NORTH SIDE ELEVATION AND SUNKEN COURTYARD

The north elevation is symmetrical, with a deeply recessed two-storey, three-bay central section opening onto a sunken paved courtyard. At upper floor level there is a large central square-headed window opening containing a leaded stained glass window depicting the Robinson family crest, dated 1921. At lower level, a square-headed door opening contains a replacement timber panelled door leading into the courtyard. Further door openings in the inner cheeks of the projecting wings also have replacement timber panelled doors with sidelights opening onto the courtyard; all three doors have new nosed granite steps. The courtyard is enclosed by tall rendered walls surmounted by replacement iron railing. The pair of single-storey outhouses to the north, which have pyramidal natural slate roofs, were formerly connected to this sunken courtyard.

SOUTH SIDE ELEVATION

The two-storey south elevation is four windows wide. The two central windows are recessed beneath deep overhanging eaves, while each end bay features a double-height bow. Each bow has a replacement tripartite Wyatt-type bowed timber sash window at upper level and a narrower 6/6 bowed timber sash window at lower level.

EAST REAR ELEVATION

The east elevation has an irregular arrangement of window openings, with the lawn embanked to the basement level. A flight of concrete steps gives access to a square-headed basement door opening fitted with a replacement timber panelled and glazed door.

INTERIOR

The interior has been substantially altered as a result of the circa 1995 renovation, and few original features remain. A stained glass window dated 1921, installed by W & J Robinson, survives at the head of the interior staircase; it depicts the Robinson family crest and is also visible externally on the north elevation.

SETTING

The house sits within well-landscaped grounds accessed via a short winding bitmac avenue that opens onto Hillsborough Road through a pair of cement block piers with splayed walls. The pair of single-storey brick and rendered outhouses to the north retain pyramidal natural slate roofs and form part of the listed extent of the property.

HISTORY

Shamrock Vale appears on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1833, depicted as a U-shaped building with north-facing returns and two small outbuildings. The Townland Valuation of the 1830s recorded it as a first-class dwelling measuring 54 feet by 17 feet and 10.6 feet high, valued at £5 5s 2d, rising to £19 18s 5d with six office buildings included. A memoir of 1833 described Shamrock Vale as "a very handsome dwelling, recently built and one of the most beautiful cottages in the north."

The earliest recorded occupant was Lieutenant James Clarke, who was still in residence as late as 1837 according to the Ordnance Survey Memoirs. Clarke was noted as a philanthropic figure who provided land for the erection of Blaris Schoolhouse in 1828 and contributed substantially to its construction and running costs. Around 1837, Mary Anne Saunders took up residence and remained at Shamrock Vale until her death in 1896. By 1861, Griffith's Valuation recorded the combined value of the house and offices at £24, reflecting the extension of the two outbuildings between the first and second edition Ordnance Survey maps of 1833 and 1858. It was recorded that Saunders held the lease of the house and 97 acres of land, purchased for £1,000 from the Marquis of Downshire, who remained the recorded landlord until 1902. Mary Anne Saunders left an estate of £12,538 18s 3d to her son Richard B. Saunders.

Richard Saunders occupied the house until 1902, when a Mr Frank Robertson took possession, though the house fell vacant from that year until 1909, when Admiral Alexander Calwell briefly resided there before his death later that year. In 1911 the house passed to Thomas Lecky, a 38-year-old draper, who lived there with his wife Helen and their four children; the youngest child was born on the day of the census, 15 April 1911, with a midwife also recorded as present. The 1911 census classified Shamrock Vale as a second-class house with nine inhabited rooms, and listed its outbuildings as including a stable, coach house, harness room, cow house, calf house, piggery, fowl house, barn, and turf house. By the time of the fourth edition Ordnance Survey map of 1920, up to five small outbuildings were shown to the north of the house. Lecky sold the house in 1917 to Thomas J. Thorton, and in 1924 William Robertson became the last occupant recorded in the Annual Revisions, which ended in 1930. The Robertson family were still recorded as residing at Shamrock Vale at the time of C. E. B. Brett's writing in 2002, by which point the original painted doorcase had been replaced by a new mahogany entrance. The house was first listed in 1978.