1-17 Lower Catherine Street, Newry, Co Down, BT35 6BE

Terrace of nine houses at 1-17 Lower Catherine Street, Newry, built in 1879 and named Caulfield Terrace (as inscribed on a circular granite panel between the first-floor windows of no. 17). The houses are two and a half storeys tall with two bays each, constructed in polychromatic brick with decorative bands of black and yellow brick throughout.

All nine houses share a common pitched fibre cement slate roof with red brick chimneys. The chimneys are positioned at the left end on nos. 11-17 and at the right on the remaining properties. Projecting rendered copings crown the decorative brickwork. Rainwater goods, a mixture of metal and plastic, are supported on projecting eaves courses over painted moulded brackets; between the brackets are diamond panels of black tile.

The ground-floor street facade is rendered in smooth cement on all properties, with nos. 1 and 3 additionally pebbledashed. The first-floor walls are of red brick with a projecting rendered string course separating the two levels. The left end house (no. 17) has distinctive stepped quoins, raised and rendered at ground-floor level and stepped in yellow brick at first-floor level. All first-floor window openings feature polychrome jack arches with granite cills; a string course of yellow brick connects the window heads. Between the heads and eaves brackets runs a decorative scheme of two parallel lines of black brick framing a ribbon of four yellow bricks set in quatrefoil pattern around a black brick. Between each first-floor window sits a single quatrefoil yellow-brick setting.

A semi-elliptical coach arch with a brick construction on a granite base and spring stones interrupts the ground-floor facade between nos. 9 and 11, providing access to a rear alley behind enclosed yards. The wall and window above this arch have been rebuilt without embellishment, though retaining their bracketed eaves. Decorative encaustic tiles in quatrefoil pattern are set into a band of black brick halfway up the jambs of the arch.

The building features door openings positioned to the left on nos. 1-9 and to the right on nos. 11-17, each surrounded by raised piers supporting strapwork consoles with entablature above. No original doors remain. Window openings at the front consist of one beside each door and two above, corresponding to ground-floor openings. Only no. 15 retains its original windows, all of which are 2/2 replacement sliding sash windows. The remaining properties have lost their original glazing to modern replacements. The facade of no. 5 now incorporates a shop front with an enlarged ground-floor window opening.

Originally, all houses had gabled timber dormers at the centre of the front pitch, now removed except on nos. 5, 15 and 17. The dormer to no. 11 is a modern rebuild. No. 15 is the most completely intact, featuring fretted barge boards, glazed single-pane cheeks, a 2/2 sliding sash window with a triangular louvre above at the front. Nos. 1 and 3 have had their eaves raised to accommodate a third storey. Skylights have been inserted in some houses.

The rear elevations have been significantly altered on all properties except no. 15, with new skylights, dormers, flat-roofed extensions, modern windows and cement render. No. 15 remains closest to its original state, with mortar-rendered random granite rubble walls, a one-storey scullery return at the right with door to the yard and gabled slate roof, a 2/2 sliding sash window on the first-second-floor landing with brick trimming, and a 2/1 sliding sash window to the second-floor bedroom, also with brick trim. The ground and first-floor windows at the rear are obscured by a modern timber-clad monopitch return at the left. The left and right gables are abutted by neighbouring houses.

Current condition: all but no. 17 are occupied; no. 15 is vacant and no. 17 is derelict.