Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB26/27/016

Address :
Crescent Arts Centre 2 University Road Belfast Co Antrim BT7 1NH

Townland:
Malone Lower

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Survey 2:
B+

Date of Listing:
20/03/1986 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
Gallery/ Museum

Former Use
School

Conservation Area:
Yes

Industrial Archaeology:
No

Vernacular:
No

Thatched:
No

Monument:
No

Derelict:
No

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OS Map No:
147/1

IG Ref:
J3353 7302

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Owner Category

Miscellaneous

Exterior Description And Setting

Large, brooding, somewhat Scottish tenement-like asymmetrical three-storey school building of 1873 by Young & McKenzie, with rock faced Scrabo stone façade, hipped roof and dormers. The building is prominently set on the E side of University Road at the W end of Lower Crescent. The building is irregular in plan, with a long three-storey E-W section facing on to Lower Crescent, a slightly lower (but still three-storey) return to the NW, with a large single storey hipped roof former gymnasium block to the NE. The W end of the long main section, where the building is now entered, originally contained a house for the headmistress. This end with its small garden fronting University Road still has a domestic feel, in contrast with the long, more gaunt school elevation to S. The whole façade, apart from the former gymnasium, is in a rock-faced Scrabo sandstone with dressed stone as cill bands, lintels and reveals (now all brown-grey in colour). Most of the windows are flat arch with timber mullioned and transomed frames, with some semicircular headed sashes to the SW and E end. The hipped roof is slated with some relatively large gabled dormers and tall stone chimneystacks. The long S elevation (from where the school was originally entered) is asymmetrical. To the left of centre is a shallow full height (stairwell) bay whose buttressed edges and almost spire-like hipped roof give it the appearance of a tower. To the ground floor of this bay is a large panelled timber double door with a blind ‘fanlight’ with quatrefoil recesses. The door is set within a semicircular arched reveal with moulded dripstone with decorative stops. Just below the dripstone is the date ‘1873’ in typical High Victorian entwined numerals. The doorway is flanked by small slit windows with shouldered heads. Directly above the doorway is a large semicircular headed half-landing window with tracery-like frame with twin semicircular headed lights with roundel above. Above this (to second half-landing) is a pair of narrow flat headed windows with plain sash-like frames. To the uppermost level is a roundel window with dripstone similar to doorway. To the ground floor left of the bay is a grouping of three tall semicircular headed sash windows, with a further pair to far left. Below the grouping of three windows are three flat arched basement windows, blocked up with brick in recent years. To the right of the bay are four large (six light) mullioned and transomed windows. To far right is a pair of semicircular headed windows with mullioned and transomed frames. To first floor left and right of the bay there is an arrangement of windows similar to that on the ground floor. Left of the bay they have flat heads and mullioned and transomed frames. The pair to the far right are slightly smaller than the corresponding pair to ground floor. To the second floor is a similar arrangement, but with all windows slightly smaller and with the pair to far right (where the roof level drops), set in a gabled ¾ dormer. There is a roundel window in the gable of the dormer. To this elevation there are three relatively large gabled dormers to right side of the bay roof, with mullioned and transomed windows, shaped barges and finials. To the left of the bay roof are three large Velux windows. To the W end of the ridge of the roof is a tall chimneystack in Scrabo stone, with another set at a lower level to the E end (to the E face of the roof). W elevation The W elevation is much smaller than that to S but has a more complex appearance. The elevation is largely three storey, but to left (actually the NW return) the roofline is lower and the floor levels lower. To far left is a much lower two storey section. The tallest section of the elevation to right projects forward. Set in the intersection of this section and the lower three storey section to left there is a small single storey hipped roof porch. To the W face of this porch is a panelled timber door set within a shouldered reveal. To the N face of the porch is a pair of small-ish sash windows with shouldered heads. Above the porch (to the first floor of the short N facing side of the taller three storey section) is a tall, narrow window with six light mullioned and transomed frame. To the W face of the taller three storey section there is a centrally placed two storey rounded bay with curved roof. To the ground floor of the bay are three tall semicircular headed sash windows, with three tall narrow flat headed mullioned and transomed windows to the first floor. To the ground floor and first floor the bay is flanked by windows as corresponding floors of the bay itself. To the second floor are four symmetrically arranged windows, as first floor but marginally shorter. The lower three storey return section to left has a canted (N) end. To each floor there are two flat headed mullioned and transomed windows, the left hand windows set on the NW cant. To far left the canted end of the lower three storey section merges with the much lower two storey section. To the NW cant of this there is a plain sheeted door set in a shouldered reveal with a small roundel window to the upper floor. To the roof of this elevation there four Velux windows to the lower three storey (return) section to left, with a group of four (arranged in square formation) to the taller three storey section to right. The return section has tall chimneystacks as before. N elevation The long N elevation has a complex appearance also. Much of the elevation to left and centre is taken up with the N face of the long E-W school section, however, much of this is obscured by the large single storey (but actually two storey in height) former gymnasium section. To right hand end of the elevation is the three storey return and the two storey section branching off from it (see above). The long three storey section is totally obscured at ground floor level. To first floor there is a large flat headed mullioned and transomed window to far left (left of the former gymnasium), with three more similar but smaller windows to right (of the former gymnasium). The window to far right is set within a full height recess. To the second floor there are six windows as those to first floor only slightly smaller. The window to far left (which is situated within the lower three storey section to the E end- see S elevation) is set in a large flat roofed half-dormer. Directly above the window set in the recess to far right there is another slightly smaller casement window. Set between the second and third window, and the fourth and fifth windows is a reducing chimney breast; these no longer rise above eaves level. To the N face of the roof of this long section there are three large dormers as S face (see above), with two Velux windows to the far right The large former gymnasium section has a plain cement rendered façade which the N face of which is blank, and the E face of which is largely obscured by the gabled return of the building to E (no.1 Lower Crescent). To the exposed section of the E face there is a large plain sheeted flat arch door. The roof of this section is hipped and topped with a large central corrugated-metal clad ventilation section with louvered N and S faces. The main roof has a large skylight to its N face. To the far right (W) the former gymnasium abuts the two storey section which extends from the three storey return. To N face of the two storey section there are two boarded up window openings, that to the left smaller. To the first floor are two tall-ish windows with mullioned and transomed frames, both set in small gabled ¼ dormers. The E face of this section is only exposed at upper floor level, where there are two centrally placed very small windows, close to the eaves. The canted N face of the three storey return section is only exposed at second floor level. Here there two very narrow two pane windows, with a slightly broader mullioned and transomed window to the NE cant. To the E face (which is only exposed at second floor level also) there are two narrow mullioned and transomed windows, with another slightly broader window set at a slightly higher level to far left, with another similar window below it. To the E face of the return roof there are four Velux windows. The entire roof has a slight overhang with exposed rafter ends. The rw goods appear to be mainly metal.

Architects

Young & Mackenzie

Historical Information

Upper and Lower Crescent The selling off of much Lord Donegall’s Belfast estate in the early to mid 19th century opened up large areas of land around the town for development. The lands to the south, along the Malone Ridge, were particularly attractive to developers and lead to the building of many the many fine late Georgian style terraces from the mid 1830s onwards, a trend accelerated by the establishment of the prestigious Queen’s College in the area in the later 1840s. These new grand terraces were occupied by Belfast’s professional and business classes, leaving their older residences in the centre of the town, which in turn were gradually turned into shops and offices. Upper Crescent was perhaps the grandest terrace development undertaken to the south of the town, an elegantly curving row of three storey dwellings in a late regency style built in 1846 by timber and shipping merchant Robert Corry. The authorship is uncertain, but Dr Paul Larmour has suggested that the hand of Charles Lanyon may have been involved. Corry himself undertook the building work and took up residence in the house to the east end, and, for the first few years of its existence, the row was known as ‘Corry’s Crescent’. To the immediate south of the Crescent, where the church and small park now is, there was a large lawn which Corry held as a garden. Shortly after this garden was laid out, however, Corry had it ploughed up and used for the cultivation of vegetables for relief of local workers suffering as a result of the Great Famine. To the north of this ran an old water course (which flowed northwards into the ‘Basin’- a reservoir east of the Dublin Road), to the east some smaller gardens (belonging to other occupants of the Crescent) and further to the east and to the north-east, ran Albion Lane, a narrow semi-rural laneway stretching from the north end of Bradbury Place to the east end of the present University Terrace. In 1852 Corry built another terrace to the north of his garden and just south of the old water course. This new development (the erroneously named Lower ‘Crescent’) was much in the same style as that to the south and was occupied by the same mix of professionals and businessmen, though by as early as 1860 the ground floors of some of the properties were used as offices. In the later 1860s a railway line was cut to the immediate north of Lower Crescent (along the line of the old water course), in 1873 the large sandstone building (originally Ladies Collegiate) was added to the west end of the terrace, with two houses added to the east end by the end of the decade, the most easterly of which, ‘Rivoli House’, (designed by William Hastings), originally contained a dance academy run by a Frederick Brouneau. The new railway line cut across Albion Lane and presaged the laying out of a new broader thoroughfare, ‘Botanic Avenue’. Upper Crescent also witnessed further building in the 1860s and 70s, with two large William Hastings designed properties erected to the west end in 1869, one of which, Crescent House’ (the present Bank of Ireland) also fronted on to University Road. In 1878-79 two further houses were added to this end, on the ground between those of 1869. In 1885-7 the large Presbyterian church (the present Crescent Church) was erected to plans by Glasgow architect John Bennie Wilson, on the west side of Robert Corry’s former garden, with a two storey terrace, the present ‘Crescent Gardens’, built on the site of smaller garden plots to the to east end in 1898. During the first half of the 20th century most of the properties of Upper and Lower Crescent, as well as Crescent Gardens, remained private dwellings, but by 1960 many were given over to business use whilst others were divided into flats, with the former Rivoli House (later named ‘Dreenagh House’) becoming the ‘Regency Hotel’. This trend continued and by the beginning of the 21st century none were occupied as private dwellings. In the mid 1990s three of the 1860s to 70s houses at the west end of Upper Crescent were demolished and a modern office block built in their place, whilst in 2000 the railway cutting to the south of Lower Crescent was built over, in preparation for a new development. Crescent Arts Centre This property was built in 1873-74 to designs by Young & McKenzie to accommodate Ladies Collegiate, the first serious academically orientated schools for girls in Ireland. The college was established by Margaret Byers, pioneer of women’s’ education, whose confidence in the school was justified in the jubilee year of 1887 when Queen Victoria decreed that the establishment should henceforth be called ‘Victoria College and School’. The premises remained home to Victoria College until the early1970s, when the school moved to new premises in south Belfast. In 1978, after lying vacant for some years, the building was leased by the Crescent Youth Resource Centre. Due to the lack of Arts provision in the area, the centre gradually moved to more arts-based projects and became a fully fledged arts centre in 1984. The Arts Centre acquired the property in 1988. Originally the west end of the building housed a residence for the headmistress, and to north side there appears to have been a rear garden. The large gymnasium was later built [?c.1910-20] on the site of the garden. References- Primary sources 1 ‘Henderson’s Belfast Directory’ [later ‘Belfast & Province of Ulster Directory’], 1849- 2 PRONI VAL/2B/7/1d Second valuation, Belfast, 1860 3 PRONI VAL/2D/7/43a Second valuation town plan of Belfast sh 43a, 1860 4 PRONI VAL/2D/7/43b Annual valuation revision town plan of Belfast, sh 43b, 1860-95 5 PRONI VAL/12B/43a/1-10 Annual valuation revision notebooks, Cromac Ward, Belfast, 1863-82 6 PRONI OS/8/30/2/43 OS town plan of Belfast, sh 43, 1871-73 7 PRONI OS/8/30/2/49 OS town plan of Belfast, sh 49, 1871-73 8 PRONI OS/8/30/3/43 OS town plan of Belfast, sh 43, 1883-84 9 PRONI OS/8/30/3/49 OS town plan of Belfast, sh 49, 1883-84 10 PRONI OS/8/30/3/49 OS town plan of Belfast, sh 49, 1894-95 Secondary sources 1 S.T. Carleton, ‘The growth of south Belfast’ (QUB MA thesis, 1967) 2 John Caughey, ‘Seize then the hour- A history of James P. Corry & Co. Ltd…’ (Belfast, 1974), pp.28-29 3 David Evans, ‘Historic buildings…Queen’s University’ (revised ed., 1980), p.11 4 Alison Jordan, ‘Margaret Byers, pioneer of women’s education…’ (QUB Inst. of Irish Studies, ?1988) ( An extensive programme of restoration and refurbishment is now at an advanced stage of planning. DB 20/02/2007)

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

A. Style B. Proportion C. Ornamentation D. Plan Form F. Structural System G. Innovatory Qualities I. Quality and survival of Interior J. Setting K. Group value

Historic Interest

Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Large, brooding, Edinburgh tenement-like asymmetrical three-storey school building of 1873 by Young & McKenzie, with rock faced Scrabo stone façade, hipped roof and dormers. It makes an imposing contribution to University Road and Lower Crecsent.

General Comments

Date of Survey

30 January 2002