53A Shore Road, Greenisland, Co. Antrim, BT38 8UA

This Grade B1 listed building is one of a pair of semi-detached houses at 53A Shore Road, Greenisland, overlooking Belfast Lough. Built around 1845, it is a three-bay two-storey rendered house facing south, with a shared lean-to conservatory, a two-bay two-storey shared return, and a further flat-roof single-bay two-storey return. The building may originally have formed a single unit before being divided.

The house sits on a mature site with landscaping including gravel surfaces, a large lawn, and a curved gravel drive rising through wooded areas to Shore Road, which opens onto the road via a pair of rubble stone piers and walls with steel gates.

The pitched natural slate roof has black clay ridge tiles, large rendered chimneys to either end (that to the south shared with the adjoining house), and overhanging eaves with timber fascia and replacement ogee-moulded metal guttering and cast-iron downpipes. The flat-roof return has a corrugated iron roof. The walling is painted ruled-and-lined rendered work.

The front elevation is symmetrical with square-headed window openings having bevelled reveals and painted stone sills. Windows are timber sash, predominantly two-over-two with convex horns to the front elevation. The rear elevation retains earlier six-over-six timber sash windows with cylinder glass and no horns. A round-headed window opening to the rear elevation ground floor contains a three-over-six timber sash window with incorporated fanlight, while a further ground-floor window opening contains a nine-over-six timber sash. The flat-roof return contains a further three-over-six timber sash. Ground-floor openings to the right have stop-chamfered reveals. The east gabled side elevation has single windows to ground and first floors at its ends.

The most distinctive feature is the iron-framed conservatory of iron construction with vertical glazed panes on a low rendered wall and lean-to glazed roof, spanning the southern two bays and incorporating an elliptical-headed front entrance. To the east side of the conservatory is a square-headed door opening with a timber panelled door having a glazed oval panel, dating from around 1940. The rear elevation contains a shared two-storey return to the west end and a further flat-roof return to the centre, with a square-headed door opening fitted with a vertically-sheeted timber door. A tall rendered screen wall encloses a small rear yard between the house and a later multi-bay rendered building (built around 1990) in separate ownership.

The interior retains a wealth of original features including quality timber joinery and plasterwork. The house originally contained a fine music room.

Historical context: The building first appears on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1857, captioned 'Copeland View'. Griffith's Valuation of 1859 describes the property as "2 bathing lodges as one house, let monthly, furnished, very superior and situated on shore of Belfast Lough", each valued at £27 10s and leased from Thomas Johnston. They were let separately to Captain W Malcolm and Robert McGowan. Between 1870 and 1877 the name changed. Valuation Revisions of 1864–69 name the property 'Loughside', then occupied by Jonathon Dinsore with lessor the representatives of John Cumming, valued at £51. The Valuation Revisions of 1875 describe it as 'now one house', occupied by James Cumming (later identified as Professor James Cuming, Professor of Medicine at Queen's University, the first alumnus to be appointed to a chair and the only Roman Catholic on the academic staff at that time), valued at £55. Professor Cuming was educated in Dublin, Paris and Vienna, an admirer of Horace, and inventor of the celebrated Cuming's dyspepsia powders. He was responsible for the addition of the Victorian cast-iron conservatory with ratchets for ventilation, substantial heating pipes, and fruiting vine, all of which remain in working order. After Cuming's death the house was occupied by Tom Sterling JP, a confectioner with branches throughout the city, known for his collection of antiques, furniture and silver.

The house is an excellent example of mid-nineteenth-century coastal development built to take advantage of sea views and adds significantly to the architectural heritage of Shore Road.