Bricklayer in Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch
New garden and boundary walls, piers, steps and extension brickwork, plus brick repairs, chimney stacks and repointing in lime or cement, matched to the house.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Last updated
Bricklayer, Bournemouth
A Bournemouth bricklayer for new walls and brick repairs
Bournemouth Roofing & Building is a bricklayer based in Boscombe, working across Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch. We build new garden and boundary walls, piers, steps and extension brickwork, and we repair, rebuild and repoint walls that have cracked, bowed or lost their mortar. The site visit is free, and so is the written itemised quote.
Most people look for a bricklayer for one of three reasons. A front or garden wall has been knocked, pushed by a tree root or has started to lean. Mortar is falling out of the joints, or brick faces are flaking off after a cold winter. Or there is new work to build: a boundary wall, a pair of gate piers, a garden step, or the brickwork on an extension.
Whichever it is, Thomas Hannen comes out, looks at the wall up close and tells you plainly what it needs. A repair is often enough. When a section has to come down and be rebuilt, you will hear why, and the quote shows each part of the job on its own line.
Good brickwork is mostly the parts you cannot see afterwards: the footing, the damp proof course, the wall ties, the mortar mix, and keeping the courses level and the corners plumb as the wall goes up. That is where the time goes on a job done properly.
- New walls, piers, steps and extension brickwork
- Brick repairs, rebuilds, chimney stacks and wall ties
- Repointing in lime or cement, matched to the wall
What we do
The brickwork we build and put right
A bricklayer's work splits four ways: new walls in the garden, building work on the house, repairs, and chimneys and pointing. Each list below says what that covers in plain terms, and where we would suggest a smaller or cheaper fix.
Garden, boundary and driveway walls
A new wall starts with its footing, which is most of the job. Above it the wall gets a damp proof course, piers to stiffen a long run, and a coping that throws rain clear of the face.
- Garden and boundary walls, single or double skin
- Front walls and driveway walls, kept to the height the road rules allow
- Brick piers and gate posts, with the hinge fixings built in as the pier goes up
- Low retaining walls, with drainage behind so water cannot push them over
- Brick steps, raised planters and a brick-on-edge or stone coping
A tall retaining wall holding back a real depth of soil needs designing first. We will say so at the visit.
Extensions and building work
On an extension, garage or outbuilding we build the brick and block shell from the footings up, and tie it into the house so old and new move together.
- Footings and brickwork up to the damp proof course (DPC)
- Cavity walls in brick and blockwork, with wall ties set as the courses rise
- Lintels over doors and windows, with cavity trays where needed
- Bricking up an old doorway, window or fireplace, toothed in so no straight joint shows
- Forming a new opening, propped, with a lintel sized for the load
Openings in a load-bearing wall and new extensions go through building control. We work to your drawings, or tell you when you need them.
Repairs and rebuilds
Most repair work is cutting out what has failed and putting back something that matches, so the wall reads as one piece.
- Spalled or frost-damaged bricks cut out and replaced
- Cracks raked out and repaired once the movement has stopped
- A bowed, leaning or fallen section taken down to sound work and rebuilt
- Rusted cavity wall ties replaced with stainless ones
- Bay brickwork: cracked joints where the bay meets the house, and a dropped lintel
We would talk you out of rebuilding a whole wall when only one section has moved, and out of pointing over a crack that is still opening.
Chimneys, repointing and feature work
Chimney stacks take the worst of the weather on any house. We repoint them, rebuild them above the roofline, or take a redundant one down, with the flaunching and flashings done at the same time.
- Chimney stack repointing and rebuilds
- Full and partial repointing in lime or cement
- Brick matching for repairs and extensions
- Soldier courses, brick arches and headers over openings
- Flemish, English and stretcher bond, matched to the existing wall
What to look for
Signs a brick wall needs work, and what each one means
A brick wall usually shows it is failing well before it comes down. The eight signs below are the ones to look for, each with what it tends to mean and what to do about it. Two photographs, one of the whole wall and one close enough to see the joints, tell us most of it before the visit.
- Mortar you can rake out with a screwdriver. The joints have failed. The wall needs repointing, raked back to sound mortar and filled properly, not smeared over.
- Sand collecting at the base of the wall. Same cause: soft mortar washing out. Worth doing before rain starts soaking into the brick behind it.
- Hollow or missing joints. Water sits in the recess and soaks the brick. Repoint, and check the gutter and coping above while you are at it.
- Brick faces flaking off after frost. The brick is staying wet. The spalled bricks are cut out and replaced, then the cause is fixed: often hard cement pointing on an old wall, a leaking gutter, or soil banked up against the base.
- A crack along the joints, or through the bricks. A crack that steps up through the mortar is usually movement that can be repaired once it has stopped. A crack that splits the bricks themselves means more force, so we find the cause before anything is pointed over.
- A level crack every few courses on a cavity wall. The usual sign of rusting wall ties, which swell and lift the joint above them. New stainless ties go in and the joints are made good, which is far less work than the rebuild people fear.
- Bowing or leaning. A section out of plumb, pushed by a root or knocked by a car, is taken down to sound work and rebuilt on a proper footing.
- Damp inside on one wall only. If it shows on the weather side, failed pointing or a bridged cavity is a likely cause. Get the wall looked at before you replaster.
Mortar
Lime or cement mortar? The wall decides
Lime mortar suits solid-walled houses, roughly Victorian or earlier, because those walls dry out through their joints. Cement-based mortar suits modern cavity brickwork. Hard cement on a soft, solid wall traps water in the brick, and frost then blows the faces off. Choosing the mortar is the biggest single decision on any repair.
Mortar should always be softer than the brick around it. Then, if anything cracks or wears, it is the joint, which is cheap to put right, and not the brick. We check the age of the wall, the brick and the old mortar before mixing anything, and we are happy to work in lime on older houses. Lime is slower to work and needs a frost-free spell to cure, and both the price and the timing reflect that.
Where the bricks are sound and only the joints have gone, the job is repointing. Our repointing page covers raking out, the mixes and joint profiles in more depth.
On a listed building, a change of mortar or brick can affect its character and may need listed building consent, so check the council's listed building records first. We put the mortar specification in writing so you have something to show the council.
| Mortar | Lime | Cement-based |
|---|---|---|
| Right for | Solid-wall houses, roughly Victorian or earlier, and soft or handmade brick | Modern cavity brickwork built to shed water at the face |
| How the wall handles water | Takes in a little rain, then dries out through the joints | Keeps water out at the face, with a cavity behind |
| Hardness | Softer than the brick, on purpose | Harder and denser than many older bricks |
| What fails first | The mortar, which is cheap to put right | On an old wall, the face of the brick, which pointing cannot repair |
| Working season | Slow to cure, so it needs a longer frost-free spell | Less sensitive, but still never laid in frost |
Matching
Matching bricks, bond and mortar to your house
Matching new brickwork to old comes down to four things: the size of the brick, its colour and texture, the bond it is laid in, and the mortar and joint finish. Get all four right and a repair or an extension reads as part of the house from the pavement.
Brick size and colour
Older bricks are often imperial sized, a little taller than the modern 65 mm metric brick, so new bricks will not course in line without adjustment. On a front elevation, reclaimed bricks of the same age usually match best. Round the back, a good modern match is fine. We take a sample or photographs to the merchant and compare them in daylight. On a small repair, bricks can sometimes come from a hidden wall, with new ones put back there.
The bond
The bond is the pattern the bricks are laid in. Stretcher bond, all long faces, is normal on cavity walls. Solid walls are usually Flemish or English bond, with the ends of header bricks showing. A new wall that ignores the bond stands out however good the brick match is.
Mortar colour and joint finish
Mortar is matched on sand, binder and joint profile, then a small test patch is left to dry, because wet mortar always looks darker. Flush joints suit older walls and lime work. Weather-struck joints, pressed in at the top and slightly proud at the bottom, shed rain well on exposed walls and chimneys. Either way, the joints are raked back to sound mortar first so the new pointing has depth to hold.
Brickwork and roofing
Chimney stacks, when the roofer and the bricklayer are the same firm
Chimney repointing and rebuilds sit between two trades. The stack is brickwork, but the flashings, the flaunching and the tiles round it are roof work, and all of it needs a scaffold. Bournemouth Roofing & Building does both, so one quote covers the stack, the lead and the roof around it.
That matters in two ways. You pay for one scaffold, not two. And the joint between the stack and the roof, where most chimney leaks start, is handled by the firm doing the brickwork above it and the lead below it, so there is no gap between two trades for a leak to fall into.
So yes, a roofer can do pointing, when the roofer is also a bricklayer. A chimney means working at roof level, which needs a proper platform under the HSE guidance on work at height, not a ladder. If a scaffold is already going up for a roof repair, render or gutters, pointing that elevation at the same time costs far less than a separate visit. The roof side is on our chimney repairs and leadwork page.
The same applies to an extension. We build the brick shell and can quote the roof on it too, so the brickwork and the roof are priced together on one written quote.
Garden walls
Garden walls: footings, height limits and your neighbour
A new garden or boundary wall needs no planning permission if it stays within 1 metre high next to a road used by vehicles, or its footway, and 2 metres anywhere else. Different rules apply on or next to a listed property, where an Article 4 direction or a planning condition removes the right, and to taking a wall down in a conservation area.
The Planning Portal guidance on fences, gates and garden walls sets those rules out, and BCP Council confirms your own case. Every wall then needs a footing: a trench dug past the topsoil to firm ground, filled with concrete and wider than the wall. How deep and how wide depends on the height of the wall, the ground and any roots or drains nearby, so we set it at the visit and never guess it on the phone. Above ground the wall gets a damp proof course, piers on a long run, and a coping.
A retaining wall holding back a real depth of soil is structural work, judged against Approved Document A. Walls round a raised terrace, and garden steps, are also covered on our patio page.
If the wall goes on the boundary line, or you are digging near a neighbour's foundations, the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 may mean serving notice on them first. It is not our paperwork to file, but it changes your start date, so we raise it at the visit.
Small jobs are welcome: a pair of gate piers, one bowed section, a handful of blown bricks. Send a couple of photographs with your enquiry and we can usually tell you whether it needs a visit.
How it works
How does a bricklaying job run, from visit to finish?
A bricklaying job runs in four steps: a free visit to look at the wall, a written itemised quote, matched bricks and mortar, then the build and the pointing. Anything extra found once work starts is photographed and priced before it is done, so the figure you agreed does not drift.
Look at the wall
Thomas comes out, checks the mortar, the bricks, the footing and the age of the build, and works out whether it is a repair, a repoint or a rebuild.
Written quote
An itemised price covering access, bricks, mortar type, joint finish and how much of the wall is included. No vague estimates.
Match the materials
Bricks matched on size, colour and texture. Mortar matched on sand and binder, with a test patch left to dry before we commit.
Build and point
Work carried out, joints finished evenly across the elevation, the site swept each day and cleared when we are done.
What helps before we start
Clear a path to the wall and move anything stored against it. Tell us where materials and a skip can go, and whether the pavement outside is busy. If the wall is shared, talk to next door early. In a house split into flats, the freeholder or managing agent usually has to instruct work to the outside walls, and we quote to them directly; our landlords and agents page explains how that works.
Timing
When is the best time of year for bricklaying and repointing?
Spring to early autumn is the best window for repointing and bricklaying, and it matters most for lime. Mortar must not be laid when frost is forecast, because water freezing in fresh mortar breaks it up before it sets. Lime cures more slowly than cement, so it needs a longer frost-free spell after it goes in.
Cement-based work on a new wall can carry on later into the year with care, with the work covered on cold nights. Rain and strong sun need managing too: fresh mortar is covered in wet weather and kept damp in the heat so it does not dry too fast and crack. If a wall is failing in winter, we can make it safe now and book the repointing for the right weather.
What it costs
What decides the cost of brickwork and repointing?
A bricklayer's price is set by the job, not the hour. For a new wall, the length, height, footing and brick choice decide it. For a repair or a repoint, it is how much mortar has to come out, how hard the wall is to reach and which mortar goes back in. Everything is priced after seeing the wall, with each part on its own line.
The same elevation can be a light repoint or a rebuild depending on what the mortar is doing, which is why nobody can price it honestly over the phone. These are the variables behind the figure.
What moves the number
- Size and footing. The length and height of a new wall, and how deep the footing has to go to reach firm ground. The footing is labour and concrete nobody sees afterwards, and it is the part that stops the wall cracking.
- Brick choice and match. A standard facing brick, a reclaimed brick to match a period house, or special shapes for a coping or an arch all cost differently. Sourcing a close brick match, and letting a mortar test patch dry before committing, is time nobody sees on the finished wall.
- Access. A garden wall you can reach off the ground, a first-floor elevation off a tower, and a chimney stack on a scaffold are three different prices for the same square metre of pointing.
- How deep the joints have to be raked. Mortar is raked back to sound material, not skimmed over. A deep failure is a different job from a shallow one, and it is the biggest labour variable on a repoint. Fine joints on gauged brickwork take longer than wide ones.
- Which mortar. Lime is slower to work, needs a longer working window and must not be caught by frost, so it costs more in labour and it constrains when the job can run. Cement is quicker, and ruinous on the wrong wall.
- Full or partial. One weather-beaten elevation is a different job from all four. Doing the exposed south-westerly wall now and the sheltered ones later is often the right call, and we will say so.
- Shared scaffold. If a scaffold is already up for roof work or a render, pointing the chimney or the same elevation while it stands costs a fraction of a separate visit. It is the easiest saving on this page.
Why two brickwork quotes differ so much
Usually because one of them is raking out properly, or digging a proper footing, and the other is not. Mortar smeared over failing joints looks the same on the day and starts dropping out within a couple of winters.
So ask each quote how deep the footing goes on a new wall, how far back the joints will be raked on a repair, what the mortar is made of and why, and whether the access is included. If a quote for a solid-walled period house does not mention lime at all, that answers the mortar question by itself.
In Bournemouth
Brickwork on a Bournemouth street: conservation areas, salt air and front walls
Bournemouth has twenty conservation areas, and in any of them you should check with BCP Council before taking down a front or boundary wall, and match the brick, bond and mortar on any wall seen from the street. They include Westbourne, The Saints, Meyrick Park and Talbot Woods, Dean Park, East Cliff, Boscombe Spa, Southbourne Grove and Wick Village.
BCP Council's list of conservation areas has a map for each one, so you can see whether your street is inside. Outside them, the 1 metre limit on a wall beside a road still applies, so a taller new or rebuilt front wall needs an application wherever you are.
Being on the coast changes the specification more than the price. Salt in the air keeps an exposed wall damp for longer and speeds up rust on anything metal inside it: cavity wall ties, the steel over a bay window, old railing stubs in a garden wall. So on a wall that faces the weather we use stainless steel for ties and fixings, point in a mix no harder than the brick, and pick a replacement brick fired hard enough for an exposed face. Resist sealing an old wall with a water repellent, which can trap salt and moisture behind the face.
Front walls on a pavement take knocks from cars and pressure from tree roots, and a leaning one usually needs rebuilding on a proper footing. Where a large house has been split into flats, the freeholder or managing agent orders the work, and the cost is normally shared through the service charge.
Who you are dealing with
Who you are dealing with
Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd is registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, and owned by Thomas Hannen. Thomas prices every job himself and is who you speak to. The site visit is free, and so is the written itemised quote.
We are based at 80a Wolverton Road in Boscombe and cover the whole of Bournemouth, including Southbourne, Pokesdown, Westbourne, Winton, Charminster, Moordown, Kinson and Queen's Park, as well as Poole and Christchurch. Scheduled work Mon to Fri, 8am to 6pm. Something urgent? Ring, and if we miss you we call back.
A verified Checkatrade customer rated us 10 out of 10. We have no published review for a brickwork job yet. This one is from a hard landscaping job, and it says how the work was run.
Bournemouth Roofing and Building completed a beautiful resin driveway, patio, and decking area for us. The job was quite complex and far from straightforward, but they handled everything with professionalism and skill…
Questions
Bricklayer questions, answered
Straight answers to the questions people ask a bricklayer before booking, from price and planning to matching old bricks. For anything else, ring 07435 839745 or send a photograph with your enquiry.
How much does a bricklayer charge?
Each job is priced as a whole after a free visit, not by the hour or the day, because the hours depend on the wall. On a new wall the length, height, footing and brick choice set the figure. On a repair it is how deep the joints are raked, the access, and whether the mortar is lime or cement. The written quote lists each part separately, so you can compare it line by line.
Is brickwork priced per thousand bricks?
On big new-build sites bricklaying labour is often priced by the thousand bricks laid. On a garden wall, a repair or an extension tied into an old house, laying is only part of the time. Setting out, footings, cutting, matching the brick and bond, and pointing take as long or longer, so we price the whole job.
Do I need planning permission for a garden wall?
Usually not, if the wall stays within 1 metre high next to a road used by vehicles or its footway, and 2 metres anywhere else. You do need permission on or next to a listed property, where an Article 4 direction or planning condition removes the right, or to go higher. In a conservation area, taking a wall down can need permission too.
Do I need to tell my neighbour before building a boundary wall?
If the wall sits on the boundary line, or you are digging close to a neighbour's foundations, the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 may mean serving notice first. That is your notice to serve, not ours, but it changes the start date, so we raise it at the site visit before a date is fixed.
Can a cracked brick wall be repaired without rebuilding it?
Often, yes. A crack that steps through the mortar joints is usually movement: once it has stopped, it is raked out, cracked bricks are replaced and the joints repointed. Level cracks on a cavity wall point to rusting wall ties, which are replaced. Only a section that bows or leans needs rebuilding.
Can you match my existing bricks?
Usually, yes. We match on size, colour, texture and bond, using reclaimed bricks where an older imperial-sized brick is on show, and match the mortar with a test patch left to dry first.
Should I use lime or cement mortar?
The wall decides. Solid walls on older houses need a soft lime mortar so they can dry out through the joints, and cement on them traps water that frost turns into blown brick faces. Modern cavity brickwork normally takes a cement-based mortar.
What time of year is best for repointing?
Spring to early autumn, especially for lime. Mortar must not be laid when frost is forecast, and lime needs a longer frost-free spell to cure than cement.
Can a roofer do pointing?
A roofer who is also a bricklayer can. We do both, so a chimney stack is repointed or rebuilt and the flashings and flaunching renewed under one scaffold, on one written quote.
Do you take on small brickwork jobs?
Yes. A pair of gate piers, a bowed section of garden wall, a few spalled bricks or one elevation repointed all get the same footings, materials and finish as a larger job. Send a photograph with your enquiry and we can usually tell you whether it needs a site visit.
Where we work
Bricklaying in the suburbs, towns and villages around Bournemouth
Beyond central Bournemouth, we build and repair brickwork across its suburbs, Poole, Christchurch and the towns and villages inland. Each place below has its own page on the brickwork and the planning position there, grouped by distance.
Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch suburbs
Within 8 miles
8 to 14 miles
- Stone (also Sturminster Marshall)
- Furzehill
- Ashley Heath
- Beacon Hill
- Swanage
- Holt (also Chalbury Common, Gaunt's Common and more)
- Holton Heath
- Thorney Hill
- Three Legged Cross
- Lytchett Matravers
- Langton Matravers (also Worth Matravers, Harman's Cross)
- Barton on Sea
- Corfe Castle (also Studland)
- Sandford
- Ridge (also Stoborough)
- Ringwood
- New Milton
- Wareham
- Bashley
- Burley (also Burley Street)
- Verwood
- Hangersley (also Hightown)
- Ashley
- Milford on Sea
- Everton (also Hordle)
- Spetisbury (also Charlton Marshall)
- Alderholt
- Cranborne (also Whitmore)
14 to 20 miles
- Tarrant Monkton (also Pimperne)
- Hyde (also Frogham, North Gorley and more)
- Winterborne Kingston
- Lymington
- Brockenhurst
- Boldre (also Sandy Down, Tiptoe and more)
- Sandleheath
- Bere Regis
- Fordingbridge
- Blandford Forum
- Walhampton and Portmore (also Pilley)
- Wool
- Bryanston
- Rockbourne (also Martin)
- Lyndhurst
- Sixpenny Handley
- West Lulworth (also Burngate)
- Breamore (also Woodgreen)
- Minstead
- Winterborne Stickland
- Winfrith Newburgh (also Briantspuddle)
- Milborne St Andrew (also Winterborne Whitechurch)
- Stourpaine (also Durweston, Ash)
- Tolpuddle
- East Boldre
- Cadnam and Bartley
- Lover
- Redlynch
- Downton
- Ashmore
- Woodlands
- Crossways
- Iwerne Minster (also Shroton)
- Owermoigne
Brickwork and repointing guides
Lime or cement mortar: which do you need? Single storey extension: planning and building regs Subsidence cracks: which ones matterFree quote
Book a Bricklayer in Bournemouth
Send a photograph of the wall or the chimney. Thomas Hannen will come out, look properly and put a clear written itemised quote in front of you, free.