32 Water St., Rostrevor, Co.Down

32 Water Street, Rostrevor, County Down

This Grade B listed house is a one-and-a-half-storey dwelling forming part of a picturesque terrace of three houses on Water Street in Rostrevor.

The building has a complex history rooted in earlier structures. An Ordnance Survey map of 1834 shows a building covering much of the combined sites of the present numbers 30–34. The first valuation of 1835 recorded this as a 'not new' single-storey thatched house owned by William Sarsfield, measuring 44 feet by 14½ feet by 7 feet in height, with associated outbuildings. The present terrace appears on the revised Ordnance Survey map of 1860. In the 1861 valuation, number 32 was recorded as the home of William Edwards, held on lease from Lady Florence Balfour of nearby Fairy Hill (who held it in turn from the Ross estate). The house was then measured as 7 yards by 5½ yards by 1 yard, described as having a 'bad roof' and graded as 'not new', suggesting it may have been created from the pre-1834 structure. The roof was thatched at this period.

The present appearance of the terrace—a one-and-a-half-storey picturesque row—is believed to date from 1874, when William Colgan became tenant and the property's valuation was significantly increased, from £1–15–0 to £3–10–0. This suggests major reconstruction took place at that point, though some earlier fabric may have been retained. William Colgan was succeeded by James Couser in 1892. The 1901 census records Mrs Anne Jane Couser, a 57-year-old laundress born in Donegal, as head of household with four teenage children, occupying a '2nd class' dwelling with four rooms in use. William Heaton was householder by 1936, and Emily Heaton by 1943, remaining resident until 1972.

A small extension was added to the rear of the house between 1902 and 1919. This was replaced by a larger extension after 1979. The building sits within Rostrevor Conservation Area. Water Street itself developed as an extension of the main town settlement at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries when Rostrevor expanded as a fashionable resort. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs of 1836 describe the street (then called 'The Back Lane') as running at right angles to the main street, south-easterly toward the Rostrevor or Kilbroney River, and note that the houses and cottages in this lane were 'in good order'.