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

16 The Vennel is a small, plain two-storey double-fronted stuccoed terrace house dating from approximately the 1870s, located on the north side of The Vennel in Glenarm. The building possesses a slight 'town vernacular' character and retains internal detail and period features that justify its listing.

The front elevation faces roughly south and is asymmetrical. To the right of centre on the ground floor sits a panelled timber door with a rectangular fanlight. To the left of the doorway is a sash window with horizontal glazing bars in a 2/2 configuration; an identical window stands to the right, with three similar windows positioned across the first floor. The front façade is finished in painted render with plain quoins to the left (west). The gabled roof is slated, with a rendered chimneystack to the west and cast iron rainwater goods.

To the rear, the building has been significantly altered. A large modern-looking single storey flat-roofed return is positioned on the left-hand side of the rear elevation, finished in dry dash with modern windows to the north and west faces. To the right is a small flat-roofed shed-like projection with a doorway to its east face. A corrugated plastic flat roof spans between these elements. Beneath this covering, at ground floor level of the main house rear, is a recently installed glazed door. The first floor rear contains three windows matching those on the front elevation.

The Vennel was the main road to Glenarm from Larne and the south prior to the construction of the Coast Road in the 1830s. The street's name derives from archaic Scots terminology for a narrow winding lane, and its sloping topography made it the least attractive of the village's four main streets. Early leases from 1743 onwards refer to it as the 'Stinking Vennel' or 'Stinking Vennel Street', with repeated mention of 'waste tenements'. John O'Hara's map of 1779 shows many small densely packed dwellings along both sides of much of the street's length. During the following century and a half, most of this early housing was replaced. The 1832 Ordnance Survey map shows a large gap on the south side, whilst annotations to the second valuation records of 1859 indicate substantial post-1859 rebuilding on the north side. Early twentieth-century Ordnance Survey plans and photographic evidence show that most of the present south side appears to date from the early twentieth century.

The 1859 valuation notebook records that the site was then occupied by a relatively old single storey dwelling belonging to Robert O'Hara, with another dwelling situated in what is now the back garden. Photographic and map evidence indicates that the present house was in place by approximately 1903. This, combined with the overall style of the building, suggests that like nearly all properties on the north side of the Vennel, this house dates from the latter decades of the nineteenth century—likely the 1870s. It is possible that the current building was created by raising the roof of the old single storey dwelling, though this remains uncertain. Its neighbour, number 18 The Vennel, which is roughly similar in style and proportion, is believed to have been built in 1876.

The building lies within a conservation area.