10 College Square East, Bessbrook, Co.Armagh

10 College Square East, Bessbrook

A two-storey, two-bay late-Victorian terraced house built around 1883, designed by an unknown architect, though possibly by civil engineer John Hardy. The building has an L-plan form facing southwest, with a single-storey flat-roofed rear return extending to the northeast.

The house is constructed of generally random-coursed rock-faced local Newry Granodiorite with stepped red brick dressings to jambs and stone cills. Door and window openings are square-headed with gauged brick. The pitched roof is covered in fibre cement tiles with roll-top black clay ridge tiles. A rectangular-section red brick chimney to the northwest carries a single terracotta clay pot. The eaves are flush with separate red and buff brick eaves courses above which runs an alternating red and buff brick corbel course. Rainwater goods are uPVC with half-round guttering discharging to circular section downpipes.

The principal southwest elevation is nearly symmetrical and flush with the terrace. A modest paved front yard is enclosed by smooth cement-rendered dwarf walling with a planked painted timber foot gate hung on slim posts. A concrete path leads from the gate to a two-panelled timber door at the southeast end of the facade, with two glazed panels to its upper half and a square-headed fanlight above. The fenestration is regular, with two uPVC casement windows to first-floor level aligned above ground-floor openings. To the northwest, the building is attached to No. 11 College Square East.

The northeast-facing rear elevation consists of a yard enclosed by rock-faced random-coursed stone walling. At ground-floor level to the southeast end is a widened window with replacement concrete cill; a single uPVC casement window with stone cill occupies the centre elevation at first-floor level. From the northwest end of the facade, a single-storey rear return with flat felt-covered roof projects northeast into the rear yard, abutted on the northeast by a smaller flat-roofed boiler house. The southeast side of the rear return has a painted flush timber door with a single glazed section to its top half, a top-opening timber casement window to its right, and a separate boiler house accessed from the rear yard. The rear elevation generally has a pebble-dash finish with a single red brick corbel course to flush eaves and concrete cills with uPVC casement windows. To the southeast, the building is attached to No. 9 College Square East.

No. 10 forms part of College Square, a formally designed late-Victorian square comprising 53 mill workers' dwellings arranged on three sides around a central bowling green, playground and lawn. The eastern terrace, of which this house is part, comprises twenty-three similar two-storey dwellings stepped in groups of six to respect the subtle relief of the site. Each house is set back from the perimeter public road and footpath with a modest paved front yard typically enclosed by dwarf walling topped by hooped metal railings. Bessbrook Town Hall (the old Institute building) is located to the southeast. Rear yards to each dwelling are enclosed by random-coursed rubble stone walling with square-headed door openings onto a wide rear access route.