Ballealy Cottage

Probably built about 1835 as a gamekeeper’s cottage deep in the Shane’s Castle estate, the seat of Lord O’Neill, this may have been designed by Richard Morrison, and has elaborate trefoil bargeboards, octagonal stone chimneys and a complex roofscape.

It is set in woodlands beside a stream at the end of a long lane, and survived in virtually intact condition but in very poor repair till it was offered to the Rural Cottage Holidays scheme. As its costs would fall well beyond the budget of that project, Hearth suggested it would make a suitable first Northern building for the Irish Landmark Trust, and it was restored for them in 1999, using traditional lime plaster internally, repairing bargeboards and windows, rebuilding the chimneys and retaining original features such as a coal-fired laundry.