Orange Hall, 39 Hillhead, Stewartstown, Dungannon, BT71 5HT

Orange Hall, 39 Hillhead, Stewartstown

This is a modest twentieth-century Orange Hall of a type that is becoming increasingly rare. Built around 1926, it is known as Kennedys Memorial Orange Hall, named in reference to the Kennedy family who owned the nearby Mullantain House, possibly commemorating Charles Kennedy who died around 1907. The contractor was R. Stewart of Coalisland.

The building is a detached single-storey hall with a long rectangular plan and a projecting gabled entrance porch to the east. A single-storey return extends to the west. The hall is situated at the junction of Hillhead and Chambre Park on the south side of Stewartstown, with its front elevation facing onto Chambre Park.

The south-facing front elevation features the projecting entrance porch to the right, three windows to the centre, and a door to the left. The entrance porch has a square-headed timber-panelled door to the front and small square-headed windows to each side. It is topped with a pitched roof of red roof slates and timber fascia, with a small carved finial at the apex of the gable. The three central windows are four-light timber casement windows with metal grills covering them. The left door is square-headed with timber sheeting and a rectangular overlight above.

The east gable elevation contains a single square-headed timber casement window. The rear north elevation is four windows wide, with square-headed timber casement windows and cut stone sills. External walls throughout are dry roughcast render with painted quoin stones to the edges. The roof is double-pitched with original shaped red fibre cement slate and pierced clay ridge tiles. Two rendered chimneys with profiled stepped capping sit at each gable end. A metal ventilator is fitted to the roof.

The most distinctive external feature is the carved segmental-headed datestone recessed into the front elevation. It has a carved keystone to the top and a projecting roundel within the recess, inscribed '1926 KENNEDYS MEMORIAL ORANGE HALL ERECTED BY THE MEMBER OF LOL No. 142'. A separate inscribed stone at the base reads 'BUILT BY R STEWART CONTRACTOR COALISLAND'.

The western return has square-headed timber casement windows on its elevations, roughcast render walls matching the main hall, and a smooth rendered band to the base. The return roof is flat with cast-iron rainwater goods.

The setting is enclosed by a roughcast render wall to the front with a curved recessed entrance gate screen and wrought iron entrance gates. The wall has cut-stone capping with pillars displaying cut-stone pyramidal capping. The remainder of the site is secured with post and wire netting fence.

The hall retains much of its original character both externally and internally, with good proportions and details. The decorative artificial slate and decorative ventilator enhance its external visual character, while the gate screen adds to the overall composition and enhances its urban setting. The building has social importance to the local community.