Cairndhu, Ballygalley, Larne, Co Antrim

Cairndhu is a large late Victorian country house in Ballygalley, near Larne, County Antrim, built for John Stewart Clark initially sometime after 1878 — possibly to designs by architect Samuel P. Close — and then substantially extended in 1897–98 to Close's recorded designs. It is a fine example of the period and an unusual exercise in a vaguely Tudor style by a well-known local architect. The listing covers the house and its garden staircase.

HISTORY

The site appears on the 1833 Ordnance Survey map as a collection of small farm buildings. By the 1857 map the property was known as Seaview and belonged to a Robert Agnew. John Stewart Clark purchased Seaview in 1878 and appears to have rebuilt rather than remodelled it, as no trace of the earlier buildings survives. Clark continued to add to the house at various times, reportedly including work as late as 1906. After Clark died in 1907 the house was occupied by his daughter, then purchased by Thomas J. Dixon (later Sir Thomas Dixon), who added a servants' dining hall. Sir Thomas and Lady Dixon gave the property to the Hospitals Authority, and a plaque on the main staircase records that Cairndhu was given to the people of Northern Ireland on 2nd February 1948, opening as The Sir Thomas and Lady Edith Dixon Hospital on 5th December 1949. It closed as a hospital in 1986.

OVERALL CHARACTER

The house is of asymmetrical plan and irregular outline, predominantly two storeys but rising to three storeys in places, and characterised throughout by a profusion of gables and bays. Roofs are finished in green slates laid in regular courses with red terracotta ridges, overhanging eaves with projecting rafter ends, painted timber bargeboards, and moulded cast-iron gutters with square-section cast-iron downpipes. The walls are rendered with a dashed finish, with ashlar sandstone used for the entrance porch, bay windows, quoins, and block dressings to windows. Chimneys are also in sandstone with ashlar dressings and moulded cornices. Windows are mainly rectangular timber casements divided by transoms and mullions into two-light and three-light arrangements, though a number have been boarded up as protection against vandalism.

NORTH (ENTRANCE) ELEVATION

The main entrance faces north. The elevation is asymmetrical, comprising a two-and-a-half-storey block with a projecting single-storey entrance porch in a central position. To the right is a three-storey gabled projection, and to the left, on the corner with the east elevation, is a diagonally placed three-storey gabled projection.

The entrance porch has two doorways, one facing east and one facing west, set within an open verandah reached by two steps. On the front face of the porch is a three-light window containing stained glass, set in a moulded surround and surmounted by a Tudor panelled stone parapet with octagonal drums at each end bearing ball finials, and a stepped shield panel in the centre. The flat roof of the porch extends to each side to form a first-floor balcony, which continues around the corner to the left along the east elevation. The balcony has lattice-like timber balustrading, all supported below on an open trellis-work of arcaded and balustraded timbers forming the verandah.

Set back from the porch is a gabled entrance bay with a first-floor canted bay window surmounted by a parapet of similar Tudor panelling to that of the porch. To the right of that gable, another gabled bay breaks the eaves line. Further right, the three-storey gabled projection contains three-light windows to the ground and first floors and a two-light window to the second floor. At the extreme right, set back beyond the entrance front, is the north end of the service wing: twin-gabled, with similar walls, roofs, and windows, but its appearance is spoiled by later external fire-escape stairways and a later single-storey flat-roofed addition.

The three-storey gabled projection to the left of the entrance bay has three windows to each of the ground and first floors, all dressed in ashlar sandstone. The ground-floor windows have leaded glazing and are currently boarded up. The first-floor windows are timber sliding sashes, vertically hung, one-over-one with horns, currently boarded up. The second floor matches the first. The side face of this projection, angled to the entrance front, has a hipped dormer in ashlar stonework with a terracotta finial and a single-light casement or fixed light.

EAST ELEVATION

The east elevation is of similar character to the entrance elevation. The side of the diagonally projecting corner bay, angled to the east, has a hipped dormer at second-floor level similar to that described above, symmetrically arranged around the angled face. The three-storey block at this end has a hipped roof. The verandah and balcony extend from the right-hand corner of this block across to a projecting two-storey gabled bay. This bay has two windows to the ashlar-faced ground floor and a three-light window to the first-floor gable, surmounted by a rough-faced triangular pedimental panel above the window. At the base of this panel is a small decoratively treated wrought-iron balcony with Gothic arcading and floral ornament, carried on four cast-iron brackets.

Beyond a recess to the left — one window wide and containing a rectangular doorway reached by stone steps, now boarded up — is a taller two-storey gabled projection with a canted bay to the ground floor, an arcaded parapet of simplified design, and an elaborate raised dressing around the window in the gable above. There is a simple gabled dormer in the south side of this projection. At the extreme left of the east elevation is a two-storey bay with a rectangular oriel to the first floor: a four-light arrangement of transom and mullions, one window deep, carried on four shaped sandstone brackets, with a hipped roof of red tiles.

SOUTH ELEVATION

The south elevation is of similar character to the previous two, comprising five gabled projections with a verandah and balcony running between the two end bays, which project further forward than the central three.

From right to left, the main features are as follows. The first gable has a three-light timber window surmounted by a rock-faced pedimental panel similar to that on the east elevation, apparently intended to be carved with an inscription or other decoration but never executed; the canted bay below has a small hipped roof of red tiles. The second gable from the right has a two-storey canted bay with a steep hipped roof, and a steep pyramidal-roofed dormer with a lead-covered ball finial in the angle of the building to the right-hand side of the gable. The third gable from the right surmounts a two-storey canted bay that oversails to each side on timber brackets with curvilinear, fret-like struts; the bay is of dressed ashlar and the gable is rendered. The fourth gable from the right surmounts a shallow rectangular bay of dressed stone, with the gable rendered.

The fifth gable, at the left end of the elevation, has a canted bay to the ground floor and an open arcaded timber balcony above. The ground-floor bay has three rectangular timber vertically hung sashes, one-over-one with horns. The first floor has a three-light transom-and-mullioned window incorporating a central French window casement and top-hung vents. The balcony woodwork features turned posts with shafts tapering towards the base, Tudor-like arcading to the spandrels, and lattice-like diagonally strutted and arcaded timber balcony railings, beneath a steeply pitched green-slated hipped roof.

The timber verandah between the outermost gables has similar detailing to the one on the entrance front. Some of it has since been glazed, but the balcony railings have been replaced with later painted tubular steel, which is considered inappropriate. Originally all the large gables on both the south and east elevations had elaborate fret-like spandrel timbers; these have all been removed.

WEST ELEVATION

The west elevation is plainer than the others but uses the same wall and roof materials. It comprises a central three-storey gable, a long block with an unbroken roof to the right, and a shorter block with one small gabled dormer to the left. Windows are smaller than elsewhere, mainly timber sliding sashes, vertically hung, one-over-one with horns, to the upper floors, along with three small two-centred arched windows, similarly sashed. There are two canted bays to the ground floor with hipped roofs. A later cement-rendered square-section flue abuts the central gable. A later flat-roofed block with rooflights has been added at the left-hand extremity, embracing the end of the block; it is largely hidden from view from the west by being built into the slope of the hill, with only a narrow passageway skirting it.

REAR COURT

Returning to the north elevation, a passage between the entrance front and a single-storey block added to the south elevation leads into an open rear court. The court is overlooked by various two-storey gables and a large three-storey dormered block, all containing mainly rectangular timber windows sashed one-over-one with horns, largely plain glazed but with some stained glass, and some three-light casements or fixed lights with leaded or stained glazing. There are also two single-storey canted bays, one with stained glass and a hipped lead roof. The court surface is hard-paved and moss-covered.

GARDEN STAIRCASE

Adjacent to the south-west corner of the building is a flight of exterior garden steps designed in a Renaissance classical style, executed in what appears to be reconstituted stone. It has been badly damaged, with balusters, finials, and copings fractured or missing; some balusters have been removed inside the house for safe-keeping. The retaining wall is rendered to match the main house and has raised quoins.

SETTING

The house stands in a rural area within its own extensive and well-kept grounds, surrounded by lawns and set among mature trees. A driveway winds up to a tarmac forecourt on the north side, running from a former front gateway well to the east, though the building is now also approached at an intermediate point on the driveway via a new link to the adjacent country park. Associated with the house are a detached stable block to the west, a gate lodge standing alongside the former front gateway to the east, and a boathouse on the opposite side of the main road from the former gate lodge. There is also a small single-storey red brick building known as the petrol house standing near the stables, and a small wooden pedestrian gateway at the south end of the boundary to the Coast Road.