9 The Vennel, Glenarm, Ballymena, Co Antrim, BT44 0AN

9 The Vennel, Glenarm is a single storey gabled church hall built in 1884 to serve as the parochial hall of St. Patrick's Church of Ireland. The building occupies the south side of The Vennel, a street that predates the Coast Road constructed in the 1830s and was historically the main route from Larne southward. The name 'Vennel' derives from an archaic Scots term for a narrow winding lane, and the street's sloping topography reflects its modest character; early leases from 1743 onwards refer to it as the 'Stinking Vennel' and document small, densely packed dwellings along its length.

The hall presents a one and a half storey front gable facing north. Its porch, positioned at the lower half of the gable, features a corrugated asbestos-covered gabled roof to its centre with plain barges, flanked by flat roofed sections. The porch gable contains a pointed gothic arch doorway with a timber sheeted door and sandstone dressings with bevelled reveal. Carved into the dressings above the arch head is the inscription 'St. Patrick's Church Parochial Hall', beneath which sits a small moulded shield-shaped sandstone plaque dated '1884' in intertwined numerals. The flanking flat roofed porch sections are blank. The main gable displays two pointed arch windows set at a high level either side of the porch gable, with a small roundel window above them at the apex. All windows contain lattice-paned stained glass with smooth cement surrounds. A smooth cement course runs at the arch springing height of the pointed arch windows. The rear gable, visible only from the rear of number 4 Altmore Street, contains three tall pointed arch windows, with the central example being the tallest.

The façade is finished in dry dash with rough cast to the porch. The west elevation appears to be cement rendered, whilst the east elevation displays harling-like render in part. The rear gable was originally finished in dry dash but much has fallen away to reveal underlying limestone construction with brick dressing to the windows. The gabled roof is slated with red clay 'saw-tooth' ridge tiles with finials to the gables. The roof overhangs at the front gable with plain barges and boxed in eaves. An east elevation shed, belonging to the neighbouring property, abuts the hall to the left of centre.

The site previously held a small Methodist church, described in the 1835 Ordnance Survey Memoirs as 'a very neat, plain little building', constructed in 1829 at a cost of £80. The hall is situated within a conservation area.