29 Kilkeel Rd, Hilltown, Newry, Co Down, BT34 5XZ

29 Kilkeel Road is a two-storey vernacular farmhouse set down a lane on the south side of Kilkeel Road in Hilltown, Co Down. It dates to the early 20th century (1900-1919) and retains most of its original features, illustrating the evolution of the traditional single-storey vernacular house form.

The house is arranged as two bays with a north-facing front elevation. It is built of granite rubble stone with smooth painted lined render to the walls. The pitched roof is finished in natural slate with rendered and coped chimneys to each gable end, each topped with two decorative pots. Semicircular metal rainwater goods with a downpipe are positioned at the right of the facade.

The main entrance is set within a shallow gabled porch that abuts the left side of the right bay. The porch has a pitched natural slate roof with dentilled decorative bargeboards and a timber finial. Its walls match the house, and the cheeks are blank. The front wall of the porch contains a four-panelled painted timber door with boarded-up transom light above. The door panels are raised and fielded with decorative stop-end chamfers and beading, and a cast iron doorknocker is fitted. A chamfered rendered keystone sits in the wall above. Hooks for a half door are attached to the left jamb.

To the right of the porch is a 2/2 horizontally divided sliding sash window with horns, exposed boxes and a granite cill. The left bay contains a similar window. Three further windows are positioned to the first floor: two in line with the ground-floor examples, and a third to the left of the porch. All sash windows display the same detailing.

The left gable is abutted by a single-storey, single-bay outbuilding with a pitched natural slate roof and plastic rainwater goods. Its walls are unevenly rendered and whitewashed. A tongue-and-groove sheeted door painted is positioned to the right of centre, with its left gable blank. A boarded-over doorway is set left of centre in its rear wall.

The rear elevation of the house is smooth rendered with no door. Windows mirror those on the facade except for a small window without a cill positioned centrally between ground and first-floor levels.

The setting includes flat iron gates with ram's horns and dog bars to the bottom half, hung on a pair of modern rendered gateposts with pyramidal caps. A yard to the front contains a single-storey outbuilding detailed and aligned north-south as the building abutting the house. A lane runs to the right of the house leading to the garden and rear fields. The rear garden contains raised beds and is enclosed by rubble walling and mature trees.

Historical records show that a building occupied this site from 1834 onwards, though it was not cited in the First Valuation of circa 1838 as being rated below £5. It was valued at £1.5s.0d in the circa 1861 Valuation, with the valuation increasing to £3 in 1901, suggesting a complete rebuild or substantial enlargement to its present form around the turn of the 20th century.