Ardigon House, 51 Ardigon Road, Ardigon, Killyleagh, Co. Down, BT30 9TA

Ardigon House is a neat and compact two storey classical style gentleman's country residence built in 1849, standing at the end of a long drive to the west of Ardigon Road, approximately two miles west of Killyleagh in County Down.

The house exemplifies refined early Victorian classical architecture with a hipped roof and symmetrical front elevation facing southeast. The main entrance is positioned in a slightly recessed central bay and is protected by an entrance portico set upon stone steps. The portico consists of two Ionic columns and two square corner columns supporting an entablature with cornice and blocking course with panelled and corniced outer piers. The entrance itself comprises a panelled timber door with shallow panelled pilaster jambs and three pane sidelights with aprons, topped by a large elliptical fanlight with radial tracery. The entrance surround has moulded outer pilaster jambs and a moulded archivolt, with respondent pilasters backing the portico.

The projecting outer bays of the southeast façade each contain two sash windows to the ground floor, finished in rusticated render with a projecting course above window level. These windows have moulded surrounds with an entablature featuring a cornice above and a panelled sill below. The first floor of these bays has two plain sash windows with simple moulded surrounds. The central bay's first floor contains a tripartite sash window with outer pilasters and a corniced entablature supported on mullions with console brackets, topped by two moulded panels. The first floor is finished in lined render and topped with an eaves cornice and parapet featuring squat inner and outer piers echoing the portico design.

The southwest façade is rendered in lined finish and carries two sash windows to the ground floor, one retaining Georgian panes, with a window-like recess to its right. Three slightly unevenly spaced sash windows, smaller than those below, occupy the first floor. The northeast façade, similarly lined rendered, displays two sash windows to the ground floor and three to the first floor, all retaining Georgian six-over-six panes.

Extending from the far right of the ground floor on the northeast side is a high wall finished principally in rusticated render with large outer piers and inner pilasters. Midway along this wall is a panelled timber dummy door with a shallow portico featuring Doric columns supporting an entablature with cornice and blocking course with small outer piers. The remainder of the wall carries a matching entablature, cornice and parapet with similar piers and two larger outer piers capped with pyramidal tops. The wall has a chamfered base, as do the southeast, southwest and northeast façades of the house. The rear of this wall is rendered, and it turns at right angles to enclose the rear yard, its outer portion constructed in snecked greywacke stone with a brick and concrete end pier to the northwest.

The rear northwest façade is built in random greywacke rubble with red brick dressings to the openings. This façade appears originally to have been symmetrical. To the ground floor are two sash windows of slightly differing size with Georgian six-over-six panes, flanking a central timber door partly glazed with stained glass. Immediately to the right is another window, followed by a shallow lean-to structure linking to a car port to the northwest and a single storey hipped roof outbuilding to the west. The first floor contains four sash windows as described, with a larger semicircular headed stair window to the centre featuring multi-pane patterned glazing.

The roof is hipped and covered in natural slate. Four rendered chimney stacks with corbelling and relatively tall octagonal pots are symmetrically positioned. Cast iron rainwater goods serve the building.

To the rear of the house stands a large outbuilding, largely two storey in extent. Its southeast portion appears to have functioned as a dwelling, with a modern partly glazed door and a pair of segmental headed windows with modern frames to the right, plus a first floor window with Georgian panes. This façade shows evidence of alteration with odd and ill-fitting openings. The northwest portion of this L-shaped outbuilding has a rubble finish with various pedestrian, carriage and stable doors and louvered window openings to its southwest façade. To the southwest of this main outbuilding stands a rectangular rubble-built structure, part two storey and part single storey, with openings generally matching those of the larger building and a hipped roof.

The house is believed to have been built in 1849 by Francis Heron, replacing an earlier house purchased by Heron's grandfather or father sometime before 1816. The previous house, shown on the Ordnance Survey map of 1834 and standing slightly to the northwest of the present building, was probably a relatively modest one-and-a-half storey structure dating from the mid-eighteenth century. Both houses appear on the revised Ordnance Survey map of 1859, suggesting the older building remained standing after its replacement was completed. A gate lodge, contemporary with the present house, originally stood adjacent to the main south entrance but was demolished some years ago. Some of the rear outbuildings predate the present house, being indicated on the 1834 map, although the L-shaped outbuilding to the northeast side appears to have undergone substantial recent alteration. The house remained in the Heron family until at least 1965.

The front of the property is finished as a gravel forecourt. All façades below the main entablature have chamfered bases. The wall extending to the northeast, designed to simulate a single storey wing matching the house in style, is included within the listing along with the house and its outbuildings.