House Yard at, Cabra House, 10 Cabra Road, Rathfriland, Newry, Co Down, BT34 5EW

House Yard at Cabra House

A two-storey house with semi-basement set within an extensive mid-19th-century estate complex comprising house yard, farmyard, and walled garden on the west side of Cabra Road. The main house is a three-bay symmetrical neo-classical country house approached through gates and a screen along an avenue, set in mature grounds.

The house yard is paved with granite cobbles and enclosed by two-storey outbuildings. The building to the left of the main house's rear elevation is two-storey and three-bay, formerly the estate office, with a pitched natural slate roof running north to south. A dashed brick chimney sits between the left and central bays. An advanced ashlar granite eaves course carries semicircular plastic rainwater goods, and the left gable has granite skews. The yard-facing elevation is wet-dashed rubble stone. The left and right bays are narrower than the central bay. At ground floor left is an infilled doorway containing a modern 1/1 window with concrete cill. The centre has a wider original window with granite cill containing a modern window. The right bay has a segmental-headed doorway with a modern glazed plywood door. First-floor openings align with ground-floor ones: a 6/3 sliding sash with granite cills at left, a 10/5 sliding sash at centre in an opening matching the ground floor, and at right a small casement window with granite cill. The left gable is abutted by other outbuildings (a coach arch) and is rendered internally. The rear elevation facing east into gardens is much altered. Ground floor left has a modern 1/1 window with concrete cill. The centre contains a large 1970s bay window with tiled lean-to roof and plain timber windows. The right bay has a plywood door. No first-floor openings remain, though marks in the dash suggest single rectangular windows formerly occupied the left and middle bays. A small garden enclosed by rubble granite walls sits at this elevation, retaining higher ground level to east and south. The right gable is pedimented and meets the main house's right corner with no openings.

The remaining three sides of the yard are enclosed by two-storey outhouses, now derelict, with pitched natural slate roofs and whitewashed rubble walls. Openings comprise mostly sheeted timber doors, small rectangular windows (many now empty of timberwork, though some contain 3/3 sliding sashes), segmental-headed coach ways, and cart ways. The east block contains a coachway to gardens, two cart stores, and a small ground-floor workroom. The north block holds three workrooms and a coach house. The west block features a coachway to a second yard, a flight of external stone stairs with a dog kennel incorporated beneath, two workrooms, and a pedestrian way to the second yard.

The farmyard slopes west. Its eastern boundary is formed by the west block of the house yard; its northern boundary by a two-storey single-bay outbuilding (continuation of the north block of the house yard), with a gateway and much-altered lean-to block at the west end. The gates sit within a segmental-headed archway with dressed granite quoins and jambs and are original wrought iron with spiked finials, leading to a rear lane. A high rubble granite wall forms the southern boundary, fronting the house gardens and abutted by a long range of lean-to animal houses with pitched natural slate roofs, granite skews, brick eases, granite walls, and low segmental-headed doorways with granite jambs containing slots for door and gate bolts. These blocks step down in three stages of five bays, three bays, and three bays respectively; the third contains a gateway through to the garden. A similar range of outbuildings beyond these lack roofs (possibly never having had them), their walls forming small yards with small kennels and animal houses within. The west boundary comprises a high rubble stone wall; advancing from its centre is a modern single-storey concrete-block outbuilding with corrugated asbestos roof. The areas to north and west of the yard have been developed into a poultry farm with large low timber sheds in separate ownership. Walls of a third yard attached to the house yard have been cleared but remnants remain visible beneath the northern group of poultry sheds.

The walled garden forms the southern boundary of the demesne. Its high granite rubble walls, brought to courses, are accessed through gates on the north wall and one on the east wall. The interior is grassed. The gardens to south and east of the house are planted with mature beech trees, with ground falling to the south where an ornamental pond sits. The drive runs south-east from the house to a gate screen and lodge on the east boundary with Cabra Road, in separate ownership.