115 Glenarm Road, Larne, Co. Antrim, BT40 1EE

115 Glenarm Road is a good example of a small seafront villa of the Edwardian era, whose character echoes the picturesque cottages of the late Georgian and early Victorian period. The building has been well-preserved both inside and out, with later changes made sympathetically. Such houses in this state of originality are uncommon.

The property is a relatively small formal one-and-a-half-storey gable-ended detached house built in 1902-03, with later canted bays added to each end and a conservatory of circa 1980s date to the rear. It is sited on a steeply sloping site overlooking the coastline on the northern side of Larne, accessed off Glenarm Road. The house was originally built as a summer residence for William Bailie, a local businessman associated with the Kilwaughter Lime Company. The property is surrounded by a mature, well-maintained garden and reached via a driveway that slopes from the main road. A raised parking area with a timber garage is supported by a battered retaining wall. To the east and below the house stands a twin-burner limekiln.

The building is rectangular in plan with a two-storey return set to the north side of the rear. The symmetrical eastern front façade faces the sea. At the centre of the east façade is a lean-to timber conservatory or sunroom covering the front entrance. The entrance comprises paired timber panelled glazed doors with plain margins and plain overlight, set within a flat-headed opening surmounted by a squared drip moulding. To either side are flat-headed window openings, each similarly surmounted. The windows throughout have painted timber sash frames with 4-4 panes and margin panes.

To the ground floor of the south gable is a canted single-storey bay with a lead-clad mansard roof, fenestrated on each face with sash frames. Above the bay is a paired arrangement of window openings with frames similar to those on the front. The west rear façade of the main block contains a 2-2 sash window with margin panes to the left, and a circa 1980s timber conservatory to the right, which obscures an original panelled and glazed doorway.

The north façade comprises the gable of the main house and the side of the two-storey return. The return's ground floor has a doorway to the left (now the main entrance) with two windows to the right; the first floor has one window. Windows vary in size and sash configuration, with plain tripartite frames to the first floor and 6-3 and 1-1 frames to the ground floor. The south face of the return has flat-headed openings; those to the ground floor have replacement modern frames with top openers, while the first floor has a larger tripartite sash window. The west gabled face of the return has no openings.

Walls are finished mainly with ruled and lined cement render; the west side of the return is dry dashed. The roof is pitched and covered with natural slate with red fireclay ridge tiles. Eaves and verges overhang, the latter with plain timber bargeboards. There is a relatively large centrally located dormer to the front with a segmental roof glazed on all sides, and a smaller circa 1980s dormer to the rear. A small Velux window is set into the south side of the return roof. Rainwater goods are uPVC. Chimneystacks to all gables are rendered with profiled caps and various clay pots.

The setting is substantially intact. The coastal path descends steeply from the main road, with the upper section serving as the driveway. The garden falls away from the front platform towards the coastal path, while the hillside to the rear is informally planted with various pathways and steps.

Valuation records of 1903 record the property as a new house built for William Bailie, showing it as 'Seabank' on the Ordnance Survey map of the same year. The valuers noted dimensions of 45 feet by 23 feet by 17 feet for the main block, with the return measuring 17 feet by 12 feet by 8 feet, cement render walls, and a slated roof. The cost was £340 plus extras, later estimated at £384, with land leased from Edward Coey at a ground rent of £3. The property passed through the Bailie family: from William to James Bailie in 1923, to Evelyn J. Bailie in 1935, and to Louise M. Bailie in 1971, when the freehold was also acquired. The present owner purchased the building in the early 1980s.

The canted bays to the gables are later additions, possibly dating to the 1920s. The current occupant added the rear conservatory and greenhouse post-1982, as well as the margin-paned window frames. The house first appears in the Belfast and Province of Ulster Directory in 1927, when this section of Glenarm Road was included in the town of Larne itself.