Patios in Cadnam and Bartley

The old one comes up first. In Cadnam and Bartley the original 1970s flags, an old concrete apron, brick paviours or a raised bed built against the wall all come out. We dig to firm formation, clear roots and made ground, and the spoil is loaded into a grab lorry or a skip and leaves with us. Where a previous patio has been laid on top of an older one, both usually have to go.

The sub base. Geotextile separator over soft ground, then MOT Type 1 in compacted layers of about 100mm rather than one deep dump of hardcore. That single decision is the difference between a patio that stays flat and one that is rocking in three winters.

The threshold. Where a sliding door sits low, the paving goes down with a drainage channel across the opening and a positive fall away from it, so the finished surface can stay clear of the damp course. Approved Document C is why we hold two courses below the DPC wherever the garden allows, and a channel is how you get that clearance back when it does not.

Porcelain. Calibrated twenty millimetre porcelain is a sound choice in Cadnam and Bartley now. It is dense, takes almost no water and keeps its grip wet if the finish is textured. It is laid on a full bed of mortar over a slurry primed back, never on dabs, because the voids under a dabbed slab crack it.

Stone. Sandstone is the warmest and the easiest to work, but porous, so it stains and greens on a shaded side. Limestone is quieter and marks with iron. Granite is dense and hard wearing. Travertine is a poor choice in a Forest winter. Hand cut stone varies in thickness so the mortar bed does the levelling; calibrated stone is sawn to a single depth.

Falls and where the water goes. A patio falls away from the building, never along the wall. From there the water needs somewhere to go on your own land: an existing gully proved to still run, a soakaway where the ground drains, or a permeable build with an open graded base and permeable jointing so the runoff never reaches the road.

Edges and steps. Edging bedded and haunched in concrete, a coping on a low retaining wall where the lawn stands higher, a kerb line where the paving meets grass, and a gravel border along the house. Steps are set out before the paving, because on a Cadnam and Bartley bungalow plot they set the whole level.

Jointing and repairs. Hand pointing in a matched mortar or a brush in compound worked into a full joint; a grout made for dense units on porcelain. We also do the small jobs alone: a rocking slab re-bedded, a sunken bay rebuilt, cracked units swapped, failed jointing raked out and a slippery terrace cleaned and re-graded.

Thomas walks your Cadnam and Bartley back garden with you and pegs out roughly where the patio could go. He checks the damp proof course along the back wall, how the lawn falls away, what the soil is like a spade down, and which way rain will run off.

Gardens round Cadnam and Bartley are mostly generous and many sit under big trees, so he also notes where shade will fall, because a stone that stays damp in shade can turn slippery. The quote lists digging out and muck away, the sub-base, falls and drainage, edgings and steps, the slabs, and jointing, each priced on its own.

Digging, laying and pointing come under one written quote. Machines and materials come through the side gate or over the drive, with boards laid across the lawn. No trench is left open at night, the garden is tidied before we leave, and the spoil goes with us. If digging turns up an old concrete base or a drain, work pauses until you have seen a photo and a price.

A patio behind the house is normally permitted development. Planning is in the hands of the National Park Authority, and in Bartley, which is covered by a conservation area, or on a listed home, raised terraces and anything seen from a lane get a closer look. The NPA property map shows what applies to your address.

Beneath big trees a Cadnam and Bartley patio can stay wet all winter, grow algae and get slippery, and a lifted slab or sunken step will trip someone in any light. Stand a pot or a board over the worst spot and keep children off.

If rain is getting in at the back door or a sliding door, phone rather than use the form, because that is a levels fault and each downpour makes it worse. First visit, we take up and re-bed the dangerous slabs or cut in a temporary channel, then check whether the base under the rest has given way. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For a hazard, phone, and if no one picks up expect a call back once we are free.

Call now: 07435 839745

The stock here is mixed: roughly a quarter was built before 1919, about a fifth between the wars, and most of the rest after 1945, with a big share of detached houses and bungalows. Post-war houses often have generous glazing onto the garden and a very shallow step out, so a patio topped up over the years can creep towards the door sill.

The result is a Cadnam and Bartley terrace sitting level with, or above, the damp proof course. Rain that lands on the paving has nowhere to run except back at the wall and under the door, and the brickwork behind it stays wet because the paving is bridging the very thing that was there to stop it. Once that has been going on a few years you get damp on the inside face, not just a puddle outside.

So on housing in Cadnam and Bartley the first thing we work out is not the material. It is where the damp course sits, how much fall we can build in from the door to the garden, and whether the answer is a drainage channel across the threshold, a step down, or lowering the whole terrace. Get that right and the paving choice is genuinely a free one. Get it wrong and the best porcelain on the market will still send water into your kitchen.

Nearby places we also cover for patios, with straight-line distances from Cadnam and Bartley, and the other trades we offer in Cadnam and Bartley itself.

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