Survey Data
Reg No
40901248
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Technical
Original Use
House
Date
1770 - 1800
Coordinates
259170, 446203
Date Recorded
25/09/2008
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Detached four-bay single-storey vernacular house, built c. 1780, with modern extension to rear. Rounded thatched roof with netting restraint and metal stays to eaves, and smooth rendered chimneystacks with stepped coping. Roughcast rendered walls with smooth rendered plinth. Whitewashed rubble walls with thin smooth render to rear elevation and south gable. Square-headed window openings with two-over-two horned timber sash windows and timber casement windows to rear extension. Square-headed door opening with replacement half-glazed timber panel door. Detached four-bay single-storey outbuilding directly to north comprising of pitched corrugated-cement roof, roughcast rendered walls, square-headed window openings with timber-framed windows and ashlar sandstone sills. Detached single-bay single-storey outbuilding to rear comprising of pitched corrugated-metal roof, and with roughcast rendered random rubble walls. Fronts directly onto east side of street.
Appraisal
Although no longer inhabited, and despite the evident deterioration of the roof, this building retains a great deal of architectural integrity including its timber sash windows, and retains its intrinsic scale and form. Thatched buildings, although still relatively common in Inishowen, nationally are becoming increasingly rare, making their survival particularly significant. The rounded pitched roof is designed to minimise the impact of high winds, demonstrating the subtle adaptation of more common thatch detail to accommodate local climatic variations in exposed areas such as the Inishowen peninsula. The house is part of an important group of vernacular structures (40901247 - 40901250). It is marked on the Ordnance Survey first edition six-inch map of c. 1837, forming part of a named extensive vernacular clachan settlement.