Larger shed at Harbour, Ardglass, Co Down

This is a two-storey harbour-side store and former fishmart, built between 1900 and 1919, located on the south side of Ardglass Harbour. It is one of only two surviving examples in Ardglass of a Belfast truss-roofed industrial building, and together with its neighbouring shed to the east it makes an important contribution to the character and appearance of the harbour. The building sits within a conservation area and is of particular local interest and rarity.

The building is rectangular in plan, measuring approximately 7.0 metres by 18.5 metres. The lower storey is built in rubble masonry, while the upper storey is in board-marked concrete; the entire façade is whitewashed. To the north (front) elevation facing the harbour, there is a vehicle doorway constructed in vertically-sheeted timber with strap hinges, a wicket gate to the right-hand opening, four windows at ground floor level, a sheeted door to the east, and four windows at upper level together with a clock projecting from the face of the building. The windows are a mixture of timber and metal casements with inward-opening hoppers, most of which are now protected by boarding on the harbour side. The east and west gabled elevations are otherwise blank: the west elevation overlooks a walled yard, while the east elevation is attached to a two-storey belvedere set back from the main building line. This belvedere features a staircase rising to a sheeted door with a four-pane casement timber window to the left of the door, and has timber windows to its east elevation. To the south, the building backs directly onto a high rubble wall belonging to the former Ardglass Castle — a scheduled enclosure complete with battlements — and has no openings on this side. The main roof is pitched on both sides with a gable to the front (north) elevation and is covered in roofing felt, while the belvedere has natural slates.

The roof structure is of the Belfast truss type — a form of wooden bowstring girder with latticework cross-bracing, in which diagonal bracings connect the upper curved bow and lower straight cord, meeting at right angles at regularly spaced purlins on the bow. The Belfast truss roof was widely used for industrial buildings from the 1860s up to and beyond the First World War, valued for its ability to cover large clear spans using relatively small-section timbers, and for the warm surface provided by its felt covering, which was particularly suited to industrial processes. Its development was closely connected with Belfast's industrial growth, the local availability of roofing felts produced as a by-product of the gas industry, and a well-established tradition of timber construction in the city. The truss form was first advertised in The Dublin Builder in 1866 by the Belfast felt-making firm McTear & Co, and the specific fan-bracing arrangement that came to define the true Belfast truss appears to have been developed and load-tested by the Belfast firm Anderson & Co around 1896–1905. After the First World War, steel and other materials increasingly replaced the Belfast truss for larger spans, though it continued in use for moderate-span buildings through the 1930s and beyond.

Historical photographs in the McCutcheon Collection show the building with the word FISHMART clearly stencilled on the north elevation, along with associated notice boards, ladders, and other equipment. The building appears on the 1919 edition Ordnance Survey map alongside its neighbouring shed.

Charles Brett, writing in the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society survey of East Down, described the harbour area as follows: "The principal features are the inner and outer harbours… There are practical and unbeautiful fish sheds and fish shops on both piers." The building's setting is significantly enhanced by the proximity of the former Ardglass Castle's scheduled enclosure and battlemented wall forming the southern boundary.