28-31 Shiels Houses, Larne Road, Carrickfergus, Co Antrim BT38 7EA

Detached asymmetrical three-bay two-storey house built around 1830, located on the west side of a farmyard complex to the north side of Gortnacreagh Road, Omagh. The building is rectangular on plan with a single-storey entrance porch at the east.

The roof is pitched natural slate with blue and black clay ridge tiles. Two smooth rendered corbelled gable chimneystacks are present, with a third red brick chimney to the party wall added later. The eaves are corbelled with a timber eaves board supporting replacement uPVC rainwater goods. The walls are roughcast rendered with a smooth rendered plinth. Windows throughout are 2/2 timber sliding sashes, vertically divided, with diminished height at first floor. They are detailed with smooth rendered architraves and projecting stone cills.

The principal elevation faces east and is abutted off-centre at the left by the single-storey entrance porch with a pitched roof. The exposed section at left and right contains a window at each floor. A re-entrant angle at the right is abutted by an original windbreak porch with a lean-to slated roof. The right bay contains timber sheeted double doors at ground floor and a single window at first floor. The single-storey entrance porch matches the detailing of the main house and contains a single window to the east gable. The left cheek contains a timber-panelled entrance door with glazed top panels flanked by sliding sash sidelights with stone cills; the right cheek is blank. The left (south) gable contains two windows at ground floor, the left of which is 1/1 and diminished, with a single 1/1 timber sliding sash at first floor. The rear (west) elevation contains three windows at ground floor and two windows at first floor, the right of which is dipartite. The right (north) gable is blank; the render shows visible traces of an earlier flat-roof extension, now removed.

With the house are original single- and two-storey outbuildings located to the north and east with exposed random rubble walling, natural slate roofs, timber sheeted doors and metal casement windows, also built around 1830. A replacement farm dwelling was built at the east around 1970. The house is bound at the south by roughcast rendered walling with saddleback coping and is accessed via a wrought-iron gate supported on two square roughcast rendered piers.

The house is recorded on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1833, together with a small outbuilding opposite the north east elevation and a building opposite the main entrance. The second edition map of 1854 records the longer outbuilding opposite the north east corner. Townland Valuation records a dwelling house and offices valued at £2 8s. Griffith's Valuation of 1858 notes the property leased from Charles and John Gardiner and others (in chancery) with a valuation of £2 10s. Various changes in occupier are recorded within the same family, with the building valuation increased to £3 10s in 1892.

Stylistically the house appears to date from the 1830s, though the north end bay may have been added later as a byre with bedroom over. The entrance porch is also later; the original entrance would have been through the windbreak porch at the right re-entrant angle. The building is of a relatively common type and is not among the best examples of a traditional rural dwelling, though it retains many original external features including the windbreak porch and 2/2 timber sliding sashes.