Patio laying in Langton Matravers
The village was built on stone, and a good many gardens here still have the flags to prove it, usually rocking on a bed that gave up years ago.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
In a village like this the first question is not which slab to buy, it is whether the stone already in your garden is worth lifting and relaying. Very often it is, and it will look right in a way that nothing off a pallet manages.
Three calls come in more than any others. Old flags that tip when you walk the corner of them. A terrace that has gone slick and dark on the seaward side. And a bare patch where a garden has been re-planned and the paving needs setting out again from scratch.
All three come back to the bed under the stone and the way the surface sheds water. So the survey starts with a slab lifted at the edge to see what it has been sitting on, and a level run off the damp proof course. Then you get one written itemised quote with the dig, the muck away, the sub base, the edgings, the paving and the jointing priced on their own lines. The visit and the quote cost nothing.
What we lay here
Local flags, imported stone and porcelain
Lifting and relaying what is already there. Old flags are worth saving. They come up, get stacked and cleaned off, the ground is excavated to a proper formation and the spoil carted away in a skip, and then each flag is bedded back on a full wet mortar bed. Old stone is never calibrated, so thickness runs anywhere across a stack and every piece is set to the line by hand rather than tapped to a fixed depth.
New stone. Sandstone is the common import and the warmest looking. Limestone lays flatter and reads cleaner but takes a mark. Granite is dense and hard on blades, and travertine is soft enough that we would talk you out of it on an exposed terrace. Porous stone gets a slurry primer on the back and a mortar mix matched to the slab, not a general purpose one.
Porcelain. Where a garden is modern, or where somebody has had enough of scrubbing, porcelain earns its place. Calibrated thickness, tight joints, no water taken up, and a published slip rating rather than a guess. It is cut wet, primed on the back and bedded full, and it stays looking the same for a very long time.
The base. Compacted hardcore, MOT type 1, in layers to a depth that suits the ground, then the mortar bed. What we will not do is a screeded sand bed with the slabs on five dabs. Dabs feel solid on the day and leave voids that hold water, and a void is where the frost gets its purchase.
Levels and the damp proof course. The finished paving falls away from the building and stops at least two courses below the DPC. On the older cottages here the DPC is low or absent altogether, and then the answer is an open margin against the wall rather than stone tight up to it.
Steps, edges and retaining. Stone steps with a consistent rise, a haunched edge or a low retaining course with a coping, and a planted border where the ground can still take rain. Loose edges are why the outside row always drops first.
Water and jointing. A channel drain at the low end into a gully or a soakaway so the runoff goes somewhere legal, a permeable margin where the ground will take it, and joints brushed in with a two part compound rather than sand or a bagged grout. On weathered stone we point by hand in a softer mix instead.
Repairs. Rocking, sunk and lifted flags, a cracked step, algae and lichen on the shaded half, efflorescence and iron staining on new stone. Half a day sometimes, and sometimes the base has simply run out.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting your work out to somebody you have never met. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: excavation and muck away, the sub base, the falls and where water goes, edgings and steps, the slabs themselves, and jointing on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.
Paving a garden at ground level is normally permitted development and needs no planning application or building control notice. The village has its own conservation area though, and that changes what is visible from the lane: a raised terrace, new steps at the front, or taking down a boundary wall are all treated differently inside it. With fifty listed entries in the parish, a terrace against the building itself can also need listed building consent from Dorset Council, which is worth checking before anything is ordered.
Cost
What decides the price of a patio
No rate per square metre, because the slabs are the part you choose and the smallest part of the price.
Getting to it. A cottage with a shared path, a house with a gate wide enough for a micro digger, and a bungalow you can barrow straight into are three different jobs before the stone is picked. Everything comes in and goes out through the garden, often through a side gate or the house. A patio you can barrow to directly is a different job from one where every slab is carried. The work at height rules still apply to the dig and the machinery.
What is coming out before anything goes down. An old concrete slab, a raised bed, tree roots or made ground all have to be dug out and taken away, and that is priced by the load rather than by the metre. The dig is where a patio quote is won or lost.
Falls, levels and the damp course. A patio has to fall away from the house and finish at least two courses below the damp proof course, and getting that right often means steps, a retaining edge or a drainage channel. Laying a new patio up against a wall at the wrong level is the single most expensive mistake on this kind of job.
Comparing quotes? Ask how deep the dig goes and what sub base is specified, whether the slabs are laid on a full wet bed or on dabs, what the falls are and where the water goes, whether edgings and steps are included, and what the jointing compound is. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If it has become a hazard
A patio that has lifted, sunk or turned slippery
Ring rather than use the form. A slab that has lifted at one corner or a step that has dropped is a trip, and a north facing patio in winter can be genuinely dangerous. We can usually lift and re-lay the worst of it quickly, then look properly at whether the base under the rest has gone. We are a little over nine miles away across the heath, so a Purbeck address is normally looked at inside a couple of days. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
Purbeck stone is a real option here, not a nostalgic one
This is quarrying country, and the stone is still cut on the ridge. That matters for a patio because it gives you a genuine local alternative to a porcelain range designed in an office. Purbeck flags are dense, they weather to grey and buff rather than staying one flat colour, and next to the walls and the cottages here they simply look like they belong.
They also behave differently, and anyone quoting should say so. The stone comes riven and uncalibrated, so a pack varies in thickness and the labour goes up because each piece is bedded to its own depth. It is porous, so it takes a primer and it wants a lime rich or moderate strength mortar rather than a hard cement one, particularly against an old wall. It will green up on a shaded side facing the sea, and salt in the air keeps the surface damp between showers, so a sheltered terrace stays cleaner than an open one.
If the flags are already in your garden, price the relay before you price a replacement. Lifting, cleaning and re-bedding sound like more work than laying new, and often it is not, because there is nothing to buy and nothing to bring in through the gate.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We work through the village and along the ridge towards Kingston, Worth Matravers and Swanage, broadly BH19, under Dorset Council. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.
Questions
Langton Matravers questions we get asked
Can my old stone flags be lifted and relaid rather than replaced?
Usually yes, unless they are badly delaminated. They come up, get cleaned, the base is rebuilt properly and each flag is bedded back on a full mortar bed. It saves buying stone and it saves carting a pallet through a narrow gate.
Why does local stone cost more to lay than porcelain?
Because it is uncalibrated. Every flag is a different thickness, so the bed is adjusted piece by piece instead of running a level over a calibrated tile. The material may be closer in price than you expect; it is the hours that differ.
Does salt air affect a patio this close to the sea?
It keeps everything damper for longer, which favours algae, and it is hard on any metal in the job. So we use stainless or polymer fixings on drainage gratings and edge restraints, and we would put a sheltered terrace on the leeward side of the house if the garden allows it.
Will the conservation area stop me relaying my stone terrace?
No. Relaying paving in a garden at ground level is ordinary maintenance and nobody needs to be asked. It is the visible structures that are looked at, such as a raised terrace, new steps at the frontage or altering a boundary wall.
What jointing should go between weathered stone?
On old flags with irregular joints we hand point in a softer mortar, because a rigid resin compound cracks away from a soft stone edge. On new calibrated stone a two part brush in compound is the better answer.
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Price the stone you already have before you buy any
Thomas lifts a flag, looks at the bed under it and tells you whether a relay or a new patio is the sensible spend. The visit and the written quote are free.