10 Manse Road, Kilkeel, Newry, Co Down, BT34 4BN

This is a late Victorian, two-storey house with an attic, constructed between 1880 and 1888. It is one of a cohesive group of five houses built by Samuel Shannon and originally known as 'Cloona Villas', as shown on the 1901 Ordnance Survey map. The property is located on Manse Road in Kilkeel, Newry, and forms part of a larger planned communal landscaped setting with neighbouring properties.

The house is two bays wide and forms the centre one of three terraced properties. It features a pitched natural slate roof with red clay ridge tiles and decorative red brick chimney detailing on the left-hand side, shared with the adjacent property at number 12. The eaves are defined by three courses of decorative brickwork supporting half-round metal gutters. A dormer window, with a pitched natural slate roof, decorative fretted timber bargeboard, a drop finial, and two-paned side-hung timber casements, projects from the left-hand side of the front elevation. The exterior walls are red brick in English garden bond, with yellow brick detailing and a chamfered granite base course. Decorative yellow brickwork is interspersed with red brick between the ground and first floors.

A canted bay window is situated on the left-hand side of the ground floor, featuring a moulded granite cill and a flat concrete copped roof. The walls of the bay window mirror the façade’s brickwork, with the yellow brickwork coursing repeated above the window heads. It includes a two-paned sliding sash window in the face of the bay and smaller one-paned sash windows on each cheek. The right-hand cheek of the bay window has been incorporated into a modern painted timber and glass porch, which abuts the central bay and extends over number 8. The porch features a modern glazed and panelled door and a glazed roof. The original interior walls are white painted. A two-paned sliding sash window is located above the canted bay on the first floor, while a narrow one-paned sash window sits above the porch on the right-hand side. The left and right gables form party walls with the adjacent houses.

The rear elevation incorporates a two-storey return with an attic, extending across one and a half bays, with a single-story return beyond. It has a half-hipped natural slate roof, and a modern hinged casement window in the attic. The front of the property is set within a common landscaped lawn with driveways, enclosed by a granite rubble boundary wall with embattled coping. There were formerly square gate piers to Manse Road, but the gates are now gone. A private rear garden extends beyond the carriageway. The building demonstrates a high level of architectural merit due to its style, proportions, ornamentation, the quality and survival of its interior, its setting, and its group value, alongside local historical interest.