Blackhead Lighthouse, McCrea's Brae, Whitehead, Co Antrim, BT38 9NZ

An extensive lighthouse complex stands on Blackhead, a rocky promontory overlooking the Irish Sea just north of Whitehead. The complex comprises the lighthouse, fog signal station, two munitions stores, entrance gates and gate pillars, lighthouse keepers' houses, and a lighthouse superintendent's house.

Lighthouse

The lighthouse dates from 1901 and is a partly-detached three-stage structure. It comprises a two-stage masonry tower topped with a metal lantern room. The tower is slightly tapered and of octagonal cross-section, standing 16 metres high and 45 metres above mean high water spring, giving a range of 27 nautical miles. Its walls are painted and rendered, probably over stone.

The only entrance is via an internal passage from external ground level. There is a window opening to the east cant of the semi-basement (Stage 1), featuring a chamfered segmental head, stepped jambs and shouldered cill, all of finely-dressed granite. The original window frame has been removed to accommodate ventilator ducts from internal machinery.

Identical window openings appear on the north, east and south cants of Stage 2 at the top of the masonry section, each with a 1x2-paned top-opening casement; the upper pane is sloped outwards.

Above this floor sits the lantern (Stage 3), a 16-sided cast-iron structure with a shallow canted metal roof surmounted by a finialed ventilator. This vent was originally designed to remove smoke and heat from oil lamps used until electrification in 1965. A small external access ladder runs vertically up the external face of the lantern on its south-west side.

The lantern's bottom section comprises fluted metal panels. Its middle and upper sections comprise lattice glazed panels, where diagonal astragals only partially block the light beam rather than completely obscuring it. The window panels are painted on the lantern's five landward cants to block the light beam on this side—white on the outside, black inside.

An external gallery surrounds the lantern, used for cleaning the outside of the windows. It is accessed from a small cast-iron door at the base of the lantern and comprises dressed granite slabs supported on moulded granite brackets (three per cant). A four-bar metal handrail runs around the gallery, to which two aerials and a flagpole have been affixed. Each cast-iron corner post has a mushroom-shaped finial.

The lighthouse is connected to the lighthouse keepers' houses by a single-storey passage accessed from their basement. This connecting structure has a flat roof with a three-bar metal handrail along each side. Its walls are detailed as the lighthouse and have square-headed openings comprising tongue-and-groove doors to the north elevation and 2/2 sash windows to both north and south elevations. Modern galvanised steel security grilles have been fitted to all external openings on both sides of the passage.

A short distance south-west of the lighthouse is a well, the head of which is capped with concrete.

Gates and Gate Pillars

The entrance gates and wall date from 1902 and delineate the perimeter of the Blackhead Lighthouse complex. The entrance gates are at the south-west corner of the site, at the end of the single-track McCrea's Brae. They comprise a vehicular gate and narrower pedestrian gate, both of wrought-iron.

The vehicular gate has six horizontal bars and a scrolled bar at top on either side of a central ornate finial. The horizontal members are braced with two sets of diagonal bars. The pedestrian gate is of similar construction but smaller. Both gates share a common cast-iron latch post of square cross-section surmounted by a boss finial.

Each gate is hung from a square post of rock-faced basalt blocks laid to courses and embellished with stepped brick quoins and an oversailing pyramidal concrete cap.

On the seaward side, a metal stile gives access to a public footpath which leads around and through the complex to the bottom of the cliff and onward to Whitehead.

A stone wall delineates the southern and eastern boundary of the premises. It is of random rubble basalt, brought to courses, running just in from the cliff edge from the entrance gates to where the footpath descends steeply to the sea. It also demarcates the public footpath where it passes between the lighthouse and fog station.

From the north end of the wall, a barbed wire fence runs westwards up the slope and southwards along the steep scarp back to the entrance gates. This appears to be a modern fence, but the type and extent of the original fence is now uncertain.

Fog Signal Station

A detached single-bay, single-storey fog signal station of 1902 stands at the edge of a cliff projecting from the east end of the Blackhead Lighthouse complex. The building is accessed by a flight of concrete steps running from the lighthouse and underneath the public footpath leading to the sea. The path is carried under the footpath in a segmental arch and is faced to both sides by walls of random rubble brought to courses.

The building has a flat concrete roof sloping slightly to the east to a plastic gutter and steel downpipe. The walls (probably concrete) are rendered with cement. There is a tongue-and-groove timber door on the west elevation, at the end of the access passage. There is a square-headed window to each of the other elevations, all with shouldered granite cills; they are now covered over with sheets of galvanised metal.

A radar mast is affixed to the south-east corner of the building.

Munitions Store 1

A detached single-bay, single-storey former munitions store of 1902 stands on the left-hand side of the driveway to Blackhead Lighthouse. The building is of mass concrete throughout (cast in situ), with a slightly sloping flat roof and cement-rendered walls. Apart from ventilators, the only opening is a tongue-and-groove door on the south elevation.

Munitions Store 2

A detached two-bay, single-storey former munitions store for explosives used during fog operations dates from 1902 and overlooks the Blackhead Lighthouse complex. Granite steps and a concrete footpath lead up to it from the driveway down to the lighthouse.

The store has a swept curved mass concrete roof with projecting eaves and verges. A small metal lightning conductor is affixed at the apex of the east gable. The walls are cement rendered, probably over mass concrete.

The east gable has a tongue-and-groove door at left and a 3/3 sash timber window at right, with vertical metal security bars. The latter has a shouldered dressed granite cill. There is also a small ventilator in the apex of this gable. All the other elevations are devoid of openings.