Templetate Lock

Detached three-bay single-storey former lock keeper's house, built c.1835, having central canted bay entrance porch to front (south-east) elevation. Now unoccupied. Hipped slate roof with overhanging eaves, timber eaves brackets, and rendered tooled limestone octagonal-plan chimneystack. Coursed, squared, and dressed limestone wall to front, roughly coursed rubble and squared limestone and sandstone elsewhere, having dressed limestone block-and-start quoins. Dressed stone plinth course to front. Square-headed window openings, with tooled limestone lintels and sills, and having remains of bipartite two-over-one pane timber sliding sash windows. Square-headed door openings to south-west and rear elevations having tooled stone lintels, surrounds and timber fittings.

This former lock keeper's house forms part of an group with the adjacent former canal lock, and constitutes an interesting focal point on the landscape. It is of social and historical interest, having been built as an integral component of the development of the Ulster Canal, which was intended to aid industry and the development of the economy in the area through providing a means of transport for passengers and bulk produce. Modestly yet robustly constructed, this building is enlivened by a central canted bay which mirrors the angles of the octagonal chimneystack and is the key to the house's visual presence. The facade is further enhanced by pleasing contrasts between stone types and dressings as well as by the bipartite timber sliding sash windows. It forms an appealing and attractive marker in the landscape.