Patios in Corfe Mullen

Reading the ground before anything is ordered. We stand at a Corfe Mullen back door with a level and look uphill, and chalk the DPC on the brickwork before anything else. If the lawn finishes higher than the threshold, this is a drainage job with paving on top. It settles the dig depth, the fall, the edging and whether a channel is needed.

Digging down instead of building up. The tempting fix is to add height to get the paving flat. It is the wrong way round: it pushes the finished level towards the damp proof course and traps water against the wall. We excavate instead, take the spoil away and set the paving two courses below the damp course with a fall running off it.

What comes out. Old concrete flags on a bed of sand, sometimes a slab left by a shed that went years ago, and on the Corfe Mullen estate plots made ground from the build. It is dug to formation and barrowed out through the side gate, priced by the load.

The base. Geotextile membrane, then MOT Type 1 hardcore compacted in layers, a sharp sand screed to level it, and a full bed of mortar under each slab with a slurry primer on the back, not five dabs. A proper mortar bed does not go hollow. Dabs are quicker and they are why a slab starts rocking, sounds hollow underfoot and ends up cracked across the middle.

Choosing the slab. Porcelain is calibrated to a consistent thickness and stays clean in a shaded corner. Indian sandstone is hand cut and warmer to look at. Limestone and granite are harder wearing and darker, and travertine holds water. We bring samples out and lay them down wet, because a dry sample in a showroom tells you little.

Edges, steps and the lawn. Where a Corfe Mullen garden sits above the patio the back edge has to be retained rather than simply butted against soil, or the border ends up on your paving every time it rains. That means a low retaining wall or a haunched kerb with a coping, steps up onto the grass at a rise you can walk in the dark, and a gravel border along the wall to take splashback.

Water, and where it is allowed to go. The fall runs away from the house into an ACO channel across the back of the patio, an existing gully, or a soakaway clear of the foundations. Where the runoff has nowhere to go we build permeable, which is a different sub base rather than a different slab.

Jointing, and the patio you already have. Joints are filled with a brush in resin compound, a grout slurry or pointed by hand in mortar, never loose sand. If your paving has only sunk or lifted in one bay we say so and quote the lift and relay rather than the rebuild. Algae, efflorescence and staining after a wet winter are usually a clean and a re-joint.

We do not work to a rate per square metre. The paving you pick is usually a modest share of the bill; the ground work is the rest.

Getting in. A bungalow with a wide side path, a semi where everything goes through a narrow gate, and a detached house you can get a mini digger onto are three prices for the same area. Carrying every slab adds days, and where the garden steps, the work at height rules cover each open edge.

Clearing the ground. Old concrete, a raised bed or tree roots have to be broken out and carted off, and that is charged by the skip or grab load.

The clay. Corfe Mullen clay moves as it wets and dries, so a good depth of sub-base matters, and the patio has to throw water away from the house, not onto clay against the footings. A channel drain may be part of it.

Levels. The patio should finish two courses below the damp proof course and fall away from the wall. On a plot that slopes, that means steps or a retaining edge.

Questions for anyone else quoting: how deep will they dig, what sub-base goes down, will the slabs sit on a full wet bed or on dabs, are edgings included, where will the rain go, and which jointing compound is used?

We build patios in Corfe Mullen, around Lockyers and Blandford Road, along Wareham Road and out to Henbury, broadly BH21, under Dorset Council. Boscombe, where we are based, is about eight and a half miles off.

Thomas Hannen owns the firm; he comes to see the garden, checks the levels and prices the patio himself. Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd is registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. A verified Checkatrade customer scored the firm 10 out of 10. The visit is free, and the written quote with its items listed costs you nothing. A front garden that sits above the road has the same retaining problem, and a driveway in Corfe Mullen is priced with it in mind. Before you book a visit in Corfe Mullen, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Corfe Mullen 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.