placenamesCraigavad
Creig an Bháda
Craigavad’s shoreline estate links the history of Belfast’s industrial families with the development of Royal Belfast Golf Club.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- Creig an Bháda · Irish · main form
- Craigavad · English · main form
Place & story
The country house
Craigavad House existed by 1783 as a Pottinger family home and later belonged to Arthur Forbes. John Mulholland acquired it after Forbes’s death and rebuilt it in the early 1850s to designs by Thomas Turner. Later owners included whiskey distiller Edward Porter Cowan and John C. White, both associated with Belfast public life. [2]
Architecture beside the lough
The house has a symmetrical two-storey frontage in an Italianate style, with sandstone walls and a Doric entrance portico. Terraces and lawns descend towards the wooded shore of Belfast Lough. Although extended and adapted, the principal building survives as the golf club’s clubhouse. [2]
The Colt course
Royal Belfast bought the estate in 1925 and commissioned Harry S. Colt to design an eighteen-hole course. It opened in September 1926. The club had previously played at Kinnegar and Carnalea, so its nineteenth-century foundation predates its arrival at Craigavad. [3]
Geographic information
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Craigavad. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Royal Belfast Golf Club clubhouse, HB23/16/001A · Department for Communities, Historic Environment Division
- Our History · Royal Belfast Golf Club
- Royal Belfast golf course and shore at Craigavad illustration: based on a Royal Belfast Golf Club, Craigavad by Michael Parry. AI-assisted watercolour and ink adaptation; cream paper margins added, incidental clutter omitted and fine details simplified. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0. Additional reference: The Greens of the Royal Belfast Golf Course by Eric Jones, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2019-10-08. How this page was prepared.