Castlebar Technical School

Detached four-bay single-storey split-level technical school, built 1932-3; dated 1933, on a U-shaped plan with single-bay (three-bay deep) single-storey advanced end bays. Refenestrated. Hipped slate roof on a U-shaped plan, clay ridge tiles with copper-covered Celtic Cross finials to apexes, and cast-iron rainwater goods on timber box eaves retaining cast-iron downpipes. Roughcast walls on rendered chamfered plinth. Square-headed central window openings in bipartite arrangement centred on cut-limestone date stone ("1933") with concrete sills, and concealed dressings framing replacement four-over-four timber sash windows. Square-headed window openings in bipartite arrangement centred on square-headed window openings (end bays) with concrete sills, and concealed dressings framing replacement four-over-four timber sash windows centred on replacement six-over-nine timber sash windows having overlights. Set back from line of street in landscaped grounds with rendered piers to perimeter having concrete capping supporting replacement mild steel gate.

A technical school erected to a design by Rudolph Maximilian Butler (1872-1943) of Merrion Square, Dublin (Irish Builder 1932, 520), representing an integral component of the early twentieth-century built heritage of Castlebar with the architectural value of the composition, one evoking strong comparisons with the Butler-designed Ballina Technical School (1932-3; see 31204116), suggested by such attributes as the symmetrical or near-symmetrical footprint; the neo-Georgian glazing patterns; and the modulated roofline corresponding with the gradient of the plot. Having been well maintained, the elementary form and massing survive intact together with substantial quantities of the original or sympathetically replicated fabric, thus upholding the character or integrity of a technical school making a pleasing visual statement in Newtown.