Our Lady of Lourdes RC Church, Victoria Avenue, Whitehead, Carrickfergus, Co Antrim, BT38 9QF

Our Lady of Lourdes RC Church is a detached double-height Hiberno-Romanesque revival church built in 1909 to designs of E & J Byrne, located on the west side of Victoria Avenue in Whitehead. The church replaced an earlier building, St Colman's, constructed in 1899. Construction cost over £2,000, with contemporary accounts from February 1909 noting the church itself cost £1,500, the tower approximately £180, and church furniture £500.

The building is rectangular in plan with an engaged round tower to the north-east corner, porch and sacristy to the north side. Walling is constructed of squared-and-snecked rock-faced basalt over a projecting plinth with brick dressings and sandstone machicolation moulding to the eaves. Roofs are pitched and natural slated with fretted clay ridge tiles, stone verges, and masonry cross finials to gables. Gutters and downpipes are cast-iron ogee gutters with round downpipes.

The principal elevation faces east and is gabled, featuring a central round-arched-headed entrance with chamfered brick surround. The moulded brick archivolt rests on cavetto moulded impost supported by sandstone colonettes. Original double-leaf timber diagonally sheeted doors are hung with decorative strap hinges. Above the entrance, a flat-arched drip mould with label stops encloses a pair of square brick relief panels. At upper level, a group of three windows (larger to centre) is surmounted by a central louvred oculus to the apex. The three-stage round tower abutting to the right contains windows to the first and second stages; the stone belfry features Ionic columns supporting a round-arch-headed colonnade, surmounted by a conical roof and ironwork cross.

The south elevation has six pairs of windows, each set within a recessed bay with machicolated head and separated by pilasters with brick quoins. The west gable comprises a grouping of three windows (larger to centre) surmounted by a louvred oculus to the apex, flanked at the corners by pilasters with brick quoins. The north elevation mirrors the south elevation with six pairs of windows. The second bay from the left is abutted by a gabled porch with corbelled eaves; the porch entrance is two-order rebated round-arched-headed with brick hood-moulding containing double-leaf timber diagonally sheeted doors, surmounted by a brick relief panel, and accessed by concrete steps. The bay at the right is abutted by a gabled sacristy containing a pair of square-headed windows to the east and a replacement square-headed door and window to the west.

All windows throughout the church are round-arched-headed with sandstone voussoirs, stepped brick surrounds, and chamfered concrete sills, and contain leaded stained glass.

The church is situated on an elevated site within a modern churchyard. A hall and primary school lie to the west within the grounds. The site is bounded to Victoria Avenue to the east by brick walling with masonry saddleback coping. Modern steel gates to the north are supported on brick piers. Cast-iron gates stand to the front of the church, with square rendered pillars supporting further cast-iron gates to the north.

The church is well proportioned and ornately detailed, retains a well-preserved interior, and is one of the more significant buildings in the Whitehead Conservation Area.