Bricklaying at Post Green
Repointing, boundary walls, dwarf walls, garage openings and chimney stacks, in a village where bungalows are common.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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The work
Brickwork at Post Green: single storey houses, long walls, big plots
Around Post Green most brickwork sits at head height or below. Bungalows, garages, conservatory dwarf walls and long plot boundary walls make up the bulk of it, which is good news: a lot of it is reached off a tower, not a full scaffold, and that takes a genuine chunk out of what a small repair costs.
The faults here make a fairly short list. Joints on the weather side of a bungalow gable that have gone back far enough to notice. A long side boundary wall leaning into next door. A stack shedding mortar down the tiles. Or a step crack over the opening where a garage or a sun lounge was added on.
We come out, walk the whole plot rather than the one wall you have spotted, and tell you what it actually is, because a leaning garden wall and a cracked house wall are completely different problems with completely different prices. If it can wait, we say so. The site visit and the written itemised quote are free.
The work
Brickwork jobs around Post Green and Lytchett Minster
Postwar cavity walls. Most homes out in Post Green went up between 1945 and 1982, built as a brick outer skin in stretcher bond with blockwork behind and a cavity between the two.
That brickwork was pointed in cement with a thin joint and it does not wear out evenly: it goes on the exposed gable and along the top course under the verge while the sheltered walls are still perfectly sound. We rake back to sound mortar, match the mix, the sand and the colour, and strike the joint as bucket handle or weather struck rather than flush so rain is thrown clear. On the older brick in the village core the same job is done in a soft NHL lime instead, because a solid wall of that period has to stay breathable. Plenty of the housing here is single storey, and on a bungalow the chimney is a long way above a low roof, so it takes far more weather than the walls under it. Repointing above roof level, cutting out perished brick and renewing the flaunching round the pots is a small job on a bungalow, and often a tower job, not a scaffold job.
Dwarf walls, boundaries and openings. A lot of the houses in Post Green gained a conservatory or a sun lounge in the 1980s and 1990s, and the dwarf wall underneath is where they fail: a shallow footing, no damp proof course and tied badly, if at all, into the house. The result is a crack running down the joint between old and new, or a wall that has dropped at the outer corner. We rebuild those on a proper foundation, tie them in correctly and put a DPC in so the wall is not drawing water up into the frame. Plots out this way are generous and the walls that divide them are long, low and mostly built without a damp proof course, so the bottom courses turn soft and spalling starts there. We rebuild bowed lengths on a dug footing, reset the coping, and rebuild driveway gate piers so they are bonded into a wall instead of standing on their own next to it. Garages of this period were built off steel lintels, and a corroding lintel expands and cracks the courses sitting on it, so we prop, cut out, replace the lintel and rebuild over it.
How it runs
Brick and block repairs, from survey to clean up
Thomas walks each wall and elevation with you, photographs what he finds, and sets the price himself. The quote is written and broken down: access, cutting out and replacing bricks, raking out and repointing, the mortar, any lintel or tie repairs, and disposal, with a line for each wall.
A lot of the brickwork here is facing brick in cement mortar: bungalow walls, garage heads, chimneys and the boundary walls between plots. Most can be reached from the ground or a tower; a stack on a two storey house needs scaffold, and a shared wall brings in the Party Wall etc. Act 1996. Dust is kept down and swept up each day, and rubble goes with us. If a lintel over a garage door is cracked once the brick is out, or a tie has rusted, we show you a photograph and price it before carrying on.
Post Green is Dorset Council. The council can tell you if your wall is within the Lytchett Minster conservation area, which reaches into the older village. There, like for like repointing is maintenance, but a different mortar colour or joint profile on a visible wall is not. Repointing a listed building waits for listed building consent. New or raised garden walls have height limits, set out in Planning Portal guidance on fences, gates and garden walls. Structural work goes through building control.
Cost
What sets the price of brickwork on these plots
The ground moves. Post Green sits on clay that shrinks in a dry summer and swells in winter. A crack that is wider at the top, near a tree or a leaking drain, may be the ground rather than the wall, and that changes what we recommend, sometimes to a structural engineer's look before any brick is touched.
Matching the brick. Seventies facing bricks were made in colours and textures that are no longer produced. Finding a match can mean reclaimed brick, which takes time.
Mortar. Too strong a mix on a soft brick pushes the damage into the brick. We mix trial panels to match colour and strength before the main job.
Access and length. A bungalow gable comes off a tower. A long boundary wall between two gardens needs no platform but a lot of barrow runs. A chimney on a two storey house needs a scaffold, and the work at height rules are why that is priced by time and size.
Garage heads. Brickwork over an up-and-over garage door often sits on a steel angle that has rusted, and that is a lintel job.
Ask anyone else how many bricks are being replaced, how the mortar is being matched, and whether the lintel is being looked at.
If something has moved
A boundary wall gone over, or bricks dropping
Ring rather than send the form. Anything leaning, cracked through or loose overhead goes first; keep people and cars away from it. Around Post Green it is often a boundary wall between two gardens that has started to lean, or brickwork dropping off over a garage door where the steel lintel has rusted.
The first visit makes it safe by taking down loose brick, propping, or fencing it off, and the permanent repair is priced once we can see how far it goes. Brickwork is booked Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. If a wall could come down, ring us, and if you cannot reach anyone we return your call as soon as we can.
The one local thing
Green Belt: repairs are fine, new brick is a planning question
Post Green sits inside the South East Dorset Green Belt, and it is worth understanding what that does and does not touch. It does nothing at all to repair. Repointing, replacing spalled brick, rebuilding a wall on its existing line and rebuilding a stack are all maintenance and Green Belt policy has no view on any of it. Where it bites is anything new.
Green Belt policy is restrictive about new buildings and about extensions that make a house materially bigger, so a brick outbuilding, a detached garage, an annexe or a large rear extension is a planning conversation here in a way it simply is not a few miles down the road. The conservation area over the older part of the village narrows it further, because that controls appearance as well as size.
What to do with that. Settle the planning question before you settle the brickwork, not after. If you are adding, ask early whether what you want falls within permitted development for your particular property, and if it does, get a lawful development certificate so the position is on record when you come to sell.
Garden walls are the one people trip over: Planning Portal guidance on fences, gates and garden walls sets the general height limits, and a wall alongside a highway is held to a lower one than a wall between two gardens, so a perfectly reasonable front wall can need permission when the identical wall at the back does not. We will build to whatever height is permitted and tell you honestly when your drawing is over it, not build it and let you find out.
Who you are dealing with
Who looks at your walls
We are about nine and a half miles from Post Green, at our base in Boscombe, and we cover Lytchett Minster, Lytchett Matravers, Upton, Holton Heath and the villages towards Wareham. Dorset Council is the authority for planning and building control.
Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. The firm is owned by Thomas Hannen, who inspects your brickwork and prices the repair in person. Verified on Checkatrade, one customer's score is 10 out of 10. Coming to look is free, as is the quote, itemised and written. Before you book a visit in Post Green, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Post Green?
Most repairs in Post Green need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.
| Question | In Post Green |
|---|---|
| Who decides | Dorset Council is the planning authority for Post Green. Dorset Council's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | Yes: Lytchett Minster Conservation Area. Check whether your street is inside the boundary before changing anything visible. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Post Green. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | No National Park or National Landscape covers Post Green. |
Questions
Questions about bricklaying in Post Green
What counts as like for like in Lytchett Minster conservation area?
The same brick, the same mortar colour and the same joint finish as what is coming out. Post Green sits in the Lytchett Minster Conservation Area, so a repair in the existing materials is maintenance, while a change of material or a proud weather struck joint where a flush one was is a change of appearance. We take a sample of the old mortar and match to that.
Why does the join between house and conservatory keep opening?
It is usually the conservatory moving, not the house. A lightweight base beside a house on the cohesive ground under Post Green will lift and settle while the deeper footing does not, and the junction opens a little further each summer. The answer is to allow the movement rather than fight it, so we cut the junction back, form a proper flexible joint and repoint the house wall either side.
Bungalows are common here. Does that change the job?
It changes the access more than the work. On a bungalow most of the wall is reachable from a tower and a full scaffold is rarely needed, which keeps standing time down inside the conservation area. The trade off is a long low elevation with more wall at splash height, so the bottom courses take more of the attention.
Can we put a brick outbuilding up in the garden?
Building it is straightforward once the paperwork is right. Post Green lies in the Lytchett Minster Conservation Area and in Green Belt, so a new outbuilding is judged on how it looks and whether it belongs there, and permitted development is tighter than usual. Dorset Council is the one to ask. None of that touches repointing, rebuilding a boundary wall or repairing what already stands.
How do we find out if our house is listed?
The list is published, so checking an address takes a minute. There are 18 listed entries around Post Green, Post Green House among them, and we run the check before pricing because it changes what we are allowed to use. A listed building needs consent before a joint is opened. An unlisted house inside the conservation area only has the appearance rules to meet.
Nearby, and next door
Bricklaying near Post Green
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Find out what that wall actually needs
A free site visit, an honest answer about whether it needs doing yet, and a written itemised quote you can compare.