1 The Almshouses, Seaforde, Naghan, Downpatrick, Co Down, BT30 8NX

1 The Almshouses, Seaforde

A small, single-storey house with a hipped slate roof and gabled porch, forming one unit of a picturesque terrace built in 1828. The terrace was originally constructed to house six elderly residents as almshouses, along with a small petty sessions court house at the southern end. It may have been designed by English architect Peter Frederick Robinson, commissioned by Mrs Forde of Seaforde House. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs of 1836 describe the dwellings as contributing greatly to the ornament of the village, and record that the almshouses were occupied by six widows receiving charitable support.

The terrace is positioned on the eastern side of Newcastle Road at the centre of Seaforde village. To the west, a large lawn enclosed by a low rubble wall fronts the buildings. This particular house occupies the northern end of the grouping. The front façade faces west and is rendered, painted, and symmetrical. At the centre stands a relatively large gabled porch with a slated roof and exposed rafter ends. A timber-sheeted door is set into the south face of the porch. The front gable face of the porch contains a large window with mullioned and transomed frame, comprising three smaller upper lights with lattice panes of four vertically arranged panes, and three much larger lower lights. The window is topped by a granite hood moulding. To the north face of the porch return is a similar but narrower window. Prior to the 1979–80 amalgamation of the houses, a doorway existed on this side. To the left and right of the porch on the main façade are windows matching the porch design. The front façade has a granite base. The short north façade is blank and finished to match the front.

The rear elevation features a large, single-storey return at its centre, roofed and rendered with a recessed base. On the south face of the return are two timber-sheeted doors with four-pane fanlights; the right-hand door appears to lead into a shed. The gable of the return contains a window similar in size to that on the front but with three tall lights with Georgian panes and a similar granite hood. A sash window with Georgian panes (8/8 arrangement) is set into the north face, with matching windows on the main rear façade flanking the return. The main roof is hipped with exposed rafter ends; the return and porch roofs are slated. Two large six-sided granite chimneys with coping stand at the north and south ends, with the southern chimney shared. Metal rainwater goods are present. A paved yard lies to the rear.

Originally, each almshouse consisted of just two small rooms with an outside toilet. The court house fell out of use in the mid-twentieth century, and the almshouses were largely abandoned by around 1970. In the early 1970s, Hearth (later Hearth Housing Association) acquired the terrace from the Forde estate. In 1977, the National Trust converted the former court house into two separate dwellings. During 1979–80, Hearth comprehensively renovated the remaining terrace, combining each pair of former almshouses to create three dwellings in total. As part of this work, new returns containing kitchens and bathrooms were added to the rear of the entire grouping, and the whole complex was restored to sympathetic standards.

The building possesses significant group value with the other buildings in the terrace and with related Seaforde estate buildings. It retains important social and cultural heritage as an example of nineteenth-century philanthropic architecture, while its architectural interest lies in its distinctive proportions, ornamentation, and stylistic elements, notwithstanding later alterations.