4-6 Lisburn Street, Hillsborough, County Down, BT26 6AA

This is a mid-terrace three-bay three-storey rendered former house built around 1780, rectangular on plan and facing north. It forms part of a terrace of varying house types lining the south side of Lisburn Street in Hillsborough.

The building retains its original external appearance, though the interior has been significantly altered. The pitched natural slate roof is topped with black clay ridge tiles and a single rendered chimneystack at the west end. Cast-iron guttering on iron brackets, with cast-iron hopper and downpipe, runs along the eaves. The walling is painted with ruled and lined rendered finish.

The front elevation displays square-headed window openings. The second floor has replacement multi-pane timber casement windows with horizontal emphasis, while the first floor contains replacement pairs of 6/6 timber sash windows. At the centre is a neo-classical stucco doorcase with a replacement timber glazed door and sidelights, flanked by a pair of Doric pilasters supporting a plain architrave and oversized dentilled cornice.

The ground floor comprises two traditional timber shopfronts. The eastern bay has a tripartite shopfront with a central replacement timber glazed door flanked by two bipartite fixed-pane display windows, all openings flanked by slender pilasters, with a dentilled cornice spanning the entire shopfront. The western bay contains a smaller traditional timber shopfront with a fixed-pane bipartite display window flanked by slender pilasters and a modern fascia with dentilated cornice above.

The east side elevation is abutted by the adjoining building. The rear elevation features a three-storey gabled stairwing and a flat-roofed two-storey return, with a single early 6/6 timber sash window to the ground floor. The west side is abutted by the adjoining building at No. 8.

The building occupies a setting among the terrace on Lisburn Street, with a two-storey flat-roofed return and large gabled shed to the rear. An extensive rear plot is used for car parking.

Historical records show the building appears on a town map of Hillsborough dating from around 1800, when it was occupied by Mr H. Leathem. The property possessed a large L-shaped out office that no longer appeared by the 1830s. By 1861, the building was recorded as two separate properties: No. 4 was a large square building with multiple out offices, while No. 6 was a smaller oblong building. John Mulligan occupied both properties from 1864 until his death in 1870, after which they came into the possession of George Bell, a Presbyterian grocer. George Bell, along with his nephew Henry Bell from 1900, operated a ham curing and egg merchant business from the premises until George Bell's death in 1913. Henry Bell occupied the building until the end of the Annual Revisions records in 1930.

In 1974, architectural historian Brett described the building as a "dingy but rather good three-bay three-storey house, Georgian glazed, roughcast; wide pilastered doorcase" with an old shopfront, noting that it contrasted sharply with a modern shop window installed in No. 4 at that time. The building was listed in 1976. Since then, numerous renovations have taken place. In 1990 the building housed a videoshop and health and beauty clinic; further renovations in 2009 saw it occupied by a juice bar, hairdressers, and insurance offices. Throughout its recent history, the building has been converted multiple times to suit different business uses, resulting in the loss of most original interior features. The principal surviving architectural merit lies in its Georgian façade and its documented history as a shop spanning at least 150 years, with the Bell family running their business there for over a century.