Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB16/07/011

Address :
Hilltown Lodge 3 Castlewellan Road Hilltown Newry Co Down BT34 5UX

Townland:
Carcullion

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Survey 2:
B2

Date of Listing:
22/09/1981 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
House

Former Use
House

Conservation Area:
No

Industrial Archaeology:
No

Vernacular:
No

Thatched:
No

Monument:
No

Derelict:
Partially

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OS Map No:
253/16

IG Ref:
J2164 2904

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Owner Category

Private

Exterior Description And Setting

A two storey / three bay late 18th C house; symmetrical, with a pavilion and farmyard, all set in mature gardens on south side of Castlewellan Road. Pitched natural slate roof with terracotta ridges and granite skews. Cast iron cyma recta rainwater goods. Two rendered red brick chimneys, one to each gable (left one is state of collapse). Main facade faces north to road. It is lined rendered random rubble stone with stepped stucco quoins, chamfered advanced basecourse and advanced plain ashlar eaves course. Central bay is half the width of the other two bays and contains the main entrance. Two granite steps lead up to front doors. These are a pair of original four panelled painted timber doors. Panels to top and bottom are smaller and all are bead moulded and have an astragal applied. Left door has a handle and lock. Right door has a Victorian knocker and a letterbox. Framing doors is an elaborate stucco doorcase. To left and right of the door jambs (right jamb has a doorbell) are sidelights (boarded up) with advanced cills and blank apron panels below. Above is a frieze which insteps above the door, and is decorated with a bead moulding to the bottom and Scotia moulding to the top. Above the door is a semicircular headed metal peacock tailed fanlight with a moulded architrave. Over the sidelights, framing the fanlight, are three moulded segmental tympanum panels. All are inset within reeded and fluted pilasters with plain capitals which support a moulded archivolt. Left and right bays at ground floor each have two boarded up windows. All have run moulded rectangular architraves and granite cills. At first floor there are five 6/6 sliding sash windows (without horns), in line with those to ground floor but diminished in height. Abutting to left of the front elevation are the remains of a ruinous extension. The abutting wall is short and single storey, constructed in random rubble stone. To centre is a spoke headed sliding sash window (now infilled with concrete blockwork) with brick dressings and granite cill. This section appears to be one storey / one bay in size, and continues as an outsweeping curtain wall, now ruinous. It appears to be cosmetic, added to balance the pavilion at right (W). Left (E) gable is rendered and blank and is abutted to ground floor right by the aforementioned extension. Its east wall is blank. Its S (rear) wall is abutted by a red brick extension with a corrugated asbestos monopitched roof. Its E wall has a 2/2 horizontally divided sliding sash window with granite cill. There is a smaller lean-to immediately behind. Rear elevation is completely abutted at centre by a single storey lean-to. The remainder of this elevation is rendered. There are two openings to left of lean-to and two to right. To left is a boarded up window and a masonry infilled window. To right is a six panelled door with transom over, in a state of collapse; a flight of concrete steps leads up to it. Right again is a boarded up window. To first floor are five equally spaced 6/6 sliding sash windows (in very poor condition), in line with ground floor openings but diminished in height. All have granite cills, rendered brick reveals and heads; internal shutters are visible. Lean-to has a mono-pitched natural slate roof, the top of which meets main block at first floor window cill level. Its walls are as facade and it has a framed and sheeted door with transom to centre of its S face (steps lead up to door from rear garden). Both cheeks blank (possibly an infilled window on left cheek). The right (W) gable of main block is abutted at ground floor by the W pavilion, and is blank above. The pavilion forms an important role in the composition, advancing forward into the front garden to frame the house. Pavilion is single storey where it abuts the house and two storey at the W end (ground level falls to right). It has a pitched natural slate roof, aligned W-E. Front wall is rendered and has a raised blocking course and a chamfered basecourse. Advancing from centre of its front elevation is a gabled return. Remaining wall to its left contains a semicircular headed window with granite cill (now sheeted over and with head infilled). The left cheek of the advancing return is blank. Its front gable is pedimented and framed in ashlar granite skews. To centre is a concrete blockwork chimney. Filling the wall is a large semicircular headed recessed panel (possibly once contained a window) which has been roughly re-rendered. A platband crosses the gable at the springing of its head and partially wraps around to its left cheek. A rubble wall sweeps out from the right hand corner of the gable to enclose the front garden. Turning the right corner from the front gable of the pavilion return, the building becomes a two storey outbuilding fronting a yard. The right cheek of the return is painted and wet dashed. It has a large sheeted over window to ground floor left and is abutted to right by a lean-to porch which also partly abuts the right portion of the main pavilion. At first floor right, over the porch roof, is small semicircular headed window with a granite cill. At ground floor left is a hand operated water pump. Porch walls are of hand made brick. Its gable end (N facing) has a painted sheeted timber door and its right cheek has a small two paned window. The right portion of the main pavilion is set back slightly from the line of the left portion. It is abutted by the porch at ground floor left and has a door at right. Directly above the latter is a modern sheeted loading door. Right gable is abutted by a larger outbuilding (see below). Rear elevation of the pavilion is roughly constructed and looks like a two storey outbuilding. It has a single modern top hung timber window at extreme right and four plain unevenly spaced windows filling the remainder of ground floor. There are two small openings with sheeted timber shutters at first floor, both are modern openings with concrete reveals. Outbuilding in farmyard is two storeys high. It has a pitched natural slate roof, brick eaves course and random rubble stone walls (whitewashed to front). Its front elevation faces N into a farmyard. At ground floor, to right of centre, is a pair of large sheeted timber doors; there are two sets of similar, but lower, doors to left half of the facade. To extreme right is a small painted sheeted timber pedestrian door. To first floor left and right are single sheeted timber openings. To centre is a fixed 3x4 paned window. The left gable of the outbuilding is abutted by pavilion. Exposed section above is cement rendered. Rear elevation of outbuilding has a painted sheeted timber door to extreme ground floor right and three openings (timbers gone; brick dressings) at first floor level. Its right gable has three ventilation slots at ground floor and a sheeted loading door to first floor; all have brick dressings. Setting Front garden is enclosed to road by a rendered rubble stone wall, at either end of which is a pair of wrought iron gates which are hung on plain piers with pyramidal caps. The gates have plain verticals with dog bars to bottom, held in place by a curved brace. To top is at the meeting of the two gates is an iron horn and latch to secure them. The front garden consists of an overgrown drive, a lawn and some very mature shrubs and bushes. The garden is separated from the farmyard by a rubble stone wall which sweeps out from the front of the pavilion gable. To rear is a field which may have once been a rear garden.

Architects

Brettingham, R F Lilley, Charles

Historical Information

There is a plan commissioned by the Downshire family and dated c1790 by R.F. Brettingham which shows a building similar to the present one but wider and more elaborately decorated. Whilst elements may have been incorporated into the present building this particular design was not executed. The earliest plan of the existing building is by Charles Lilley, dated 1789. As well as the main block, this plan shows a central porch to N, the W pavilion with N return, and L shaped pavilion to E. It is likely that the house was erected soon afterwards as it is shown on Byer’s 1797 map and an estate map of 1803. Rankin states that the front of the house was rendered about c1830 when the present entrance was ornamented (possibly accounting for the loss of the porch). The 1834 OS 6’’ map shows the E pavilion in outline only implying that it was not complete (and never was completed). Primary sources: 1. Byer’s map of Upper Iveagh, 1797 (PRONI: D671/M7/5A). 2. Map of Carquillan, 1803 (PRONI: D671/M1/21; also D671/M7/13). 3. OS 6’’ map, 1834, County Down Sheet 48. Secondary Sources: 1. M. Jope (ed.), ‘Archaeological Survey of Co. Down’ (Belfast 1966), pp 415-6. 2. P.J. Rankin, ‘Historic Buildings of Rathfriland and Hilltown’ (Belfast 1979).

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

A. Style B. Proportion C. Ornamentation D. Plan Form J. Setting

Historic Interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

An attractive and imposing late 18th C country house, with contemporary pavilion, outbuildings and yard.

General Comments

Date of Survey

19 March 1999