St Brelade's, 2 Well Road, Warrenpoint, Newry, Co Down, BT34 3RS

St Brelade's, Well Road, Warrenpoint

A post-Second World War modernist house built in the 1950s to a design by J. Kenny, a Newry-based architect. The building is prominently located at the junction of Well Road and the coast road, facing south towards the sea.

The house is a two-storey, three-bay dwelling with a distinctive three-tier flat concrete roof. The two front roof tiers run the width of the house with advanced eaves all around each tier. The front tier (facing the sea) is slightly higher than the second tier, which is in turn slightly higher than the north-west third tier. A water tank sits between the second and third tiers, with down pipes running to the side walls.

The walls are painted and wet-dashed cement render over an exposed brick basecourse. All openings have thin cement architraves and smooth rendered reveals. All windows are uPVC with painted concrete cills unless otherwise stated.

The principal elevation faces south to the sea. The right end projects as a semicircular two-storey bay window under the main eaves. The main entrance is at the centre of the front elevation, just left of this bay window, and comprises a pair of painted timber doors with three vertical panels of fluted glass to each leaf, flanked by 1x5-paned sidelights with masonry architraves. The left bay has a large rectangular picture window with 1x4-paned casements to each side. Both door and window sit under an open flat concrete canopy, supported at its south-west corner by a slender metal column. Above the door, at first-floor level, is a triangular oriel with a transomed 1x4-paned casement to each cheek. The left bay has a window matching that at ground-floor level but slightly wider and in line with it. Each storey of the right-hand bay has a wrap-around 1x5-pane timber window, vertically divided.

The left elevation contains a pair of 1x6-paned uPVC French windows at ground-floor level to the right. At the left, on the lowest rear block, is a fixed single-paned window with 1x3-paned flanking casements. Above at first-floor level are two 1x3-paned windows sharing a common cill, with a down pipe to the right and a ventilation pipe at the left. Abutting ground-floor left of this elevation is a curved screen wall (detailed as the house walls) with a painted sheeted timber door to the back entrance and rear yard.

A garage with a shallow monopitched corrugated-asbestos roof abuts ground-floor left of the left elevation. The garage walls are as the main house, with a metal roller door to the front and a sheeted timber door and 3x3-paned metal casement window to the right (north) cheek. The garage continues to the west as a yard outbuilding, which returns north around the back of the yard.

The rear elevation is abutted to the right by a two-stage return under the third tier of the roof. The exposed wall of the main block has, at ground-floor right, a small glass-brick window at its junction with the return. Above at first-floor level is a 3x1-paned timber window with a decorative metal grille to the inside, and to its right is a tiny slit glass-brick window. The roofline of the return wraps around the west side of the rear block. Its north face (to the yard) has a transomed glass-brick window at ground-floor right and a 1/1 top-hung slit window to its left. The first-floor is blank. The left cheek extends as a one-storey extension, with a blank north wall and a 3x1-paned casement window to the left cheek. The return's right cheek contains the back entrance porch.

The right elevation of the main block has a 1x6-paned uPVC door at ground-floor centre, leading into the drawing room. Above is a triangular oriel matching that on the front elevation. On each floor to its right, on the lower rear block, is a fixed single-pane window flanked by 1x4-paned casements.

A tarmaced path runs around the front and sides of the house. The rear yard is enclosed by the garage and outbuildings. A distinctive painted dashed boundary wall encloses the garden to the south and east, featuring a linear open concrete-block coping which gives it a streamlined effect. The wall steps up at the west end of the south wall adjacent to the entrance gateway. It curves at the south-east corner and at the north end of the east wall steps up and curves inward, with a wrought iron pedestrian gate.

The house is an unusual design for the area. Its concrete roofs are of some structural interest. Original windows have been replaced by uPVC ones.

The building was designed by J. Kenny, a Newry-based architect who was also responsible for St John of God Hospital in Newry and some of the buildings within the Alexian Brothers seminary at Warrenpoint. The name comes from St Brelade's Port in the Channel Islands, where the first owners, who commissioned the house, spent their honeymoon.