Patios in Wimborne Minster, behind the old streets
Town centre gardens here are small, walled and reached through the house, so the way in decides the slab size, the method and a fair part of the price.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
In the streets around the Minster the gardens are small, walled and reached through the house or a passage barely wide enough for a barrow. That single fact shapes the whole job here: what size of slab can get in, where a mixer can stand, and how several tonnes of stone and spoil are going to change places.
The calls tend to be about a small yard that has never drained properly, a terrace laid so high against an old wall that the plaster inside is going, or paving that has simply worn out and nobody can see how it would ever be replaced.
It can always be replaced. We come and walk the route in, measure the gate and the passage, and work out what can physically be carried through. Then you get a written itemised quote with the access, the dig, the base, the paving and the jointing on separate lines, so you can see what the awkwardness actually costs. The visit and the quote are free.
The work
Small walled gardens behind the old streets
Measuring the way in. Before anything else. The gate width, the height of the passage, whether there is a step, where a lorry can legally stop and how far a barrow has to travel. A garden reached only through the house is a different price from one with a side gate, and it should be visible on the quote rather than buried in it.
Slab size, chosen for the passage. A large format porcelain slab is heavy and awkward through a narrow doorway, and in a small yard it also looks out of scale. A smaller format in porcelain, sandstone or granite carries in more easily, cuts around drains and gullies better, and suits an old walled garden far more comfortably.
Hand digging and taking spoil out. Where no machine will fit, the dig is done by hand and barrowed out. Spoil goes into a grab lorry or a skip, and where that has to stand on the highway a permit is arranged before the first morning rather than on it. Everything leaves with us and we are registered to carry waste.
Protecting the route. If the way through is your hall, the floor gets boarded and sheeted, the door frames are protected, and the route is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job.
Old walls and finished levels. A good part of the town predates damp proof courses. Paving goes down at least two brick courses below the damp course where there is one, the level Approved Document C works to, and where there is not, lower still with a drained margin along the wall so splash is collected instead of soaking in.
Base and bedding. Geotextile membrane over the formation, MOT Type 1 in compacted layers with a smaller plate where the space is tight, then a full wet mortar bed under every slab with a slurry primer on the back of porcelain and dense stone.
Drainage in an enclosed yard. With no borders to soak into, runoff has to be collected: a channel drain along the low side out to a gully, or a permeable build with open joints over a free draining base. Approved Document H covers where the outfall can go.
Edgings, steps, jointing and repairs. Edgings haunched in concrete against the boundary walls, steps off a footing with a coping front, joints brushed in with a two part compound and tooled off. Smaller jobs too: re-bedding slabs that have lifted or sunk, cutting out cracked ones, re-pointing washed out joints and clearing algae and efflorescence.
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.
Wimborne Minster has its own conservation area covering much of the old town, and the listed entries run from the Minster itself out into the surrounding streets, so appearance is controlled here in a way it is not on the edge of town. An enclosed back garden is rarely the issue; a frontage, a boundary wall or anything attached to a listed building is, and listed building consent covers the ground around one as well as the building. Dorset Council is the authority, and we check the address before quoting anything visible from the street.
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 Georgian town house with a passage to the yard, a Victorian terrace where the only way through is the kitchen, and a flat sharing a walled garden are three different jobs before a slab is cut. 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. Wimborne is about seven miles from us and we are in the town often, so it is usually a couple of days at most. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
What a narrow passage really costs
Nobody enjoys being told that access is a price driver, because it feels like being charged for the shape of your house. It is worth explaining properly. A patio of a given size needs a fairly fixed quantity of stone in and spoil out. Where a lorry can tip within a few metres of the work, that movement takes an hour or two. Where every load goes through a hall or a passage in a barrow, the same movement can take a day and a half.
That is the whole difference, and it is labour rather than materials. It also changes what is sensible to specify. Slabs that two people cannot carry through a doorway are the wrong slabs, however good they look in a brochure, and a mixer that has to stand on the street needs arranging rather than assuming.
The practical advice when you compare quotes for a town centre garden is to make somebody put a figure against the access. If two prices are far apart, that line is usually where the difference lives, and a quote that does not mention it at all has either not looked at your passage or intends to raise it once the job has started.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Wimborne Minster town, the Minster streets, Leigh Park and out towards Colehill, broadly BH21, 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
Wimborne Minster questions we get asked
There is no way to the garden except through the house. Can it still be done?
Yes, and in these streets it is normal. The floor is boarded and sheeted, everything goes through by hand and the route is swept daily. It is slower, and it appears as its own line on the quote rather than being hidden in the rate.
What size paving works best in a small walled yard?
A smaller format usually. It carries through a passage far more easily, cuts around gullies and inspection covers more neatly, and looks better in scale against old brick than a very large slab does.
Am I restricted on materials this close to the Minster?
For an enclosed back garden, almost never. Where it matters is a frontage, a boundary wall, or any work attached to a listed building. We check the address first and tell you which you are in before we quote.
Where will the skip go if there is no drive?
On the highway with a permit from the council, arranged before we start, or we book a grab lorry to arrive as the dig finishes so nothing stands out on the street overnight.
The paving is above the damp course on an old wall. What now?
It comes down. The courses nearest the wall are lifted, the level is dropped and a drained margin or a channel goes in along the brickwork. On a wall with no damp course at all the paving needs to sit lower still.
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Get the way in measured before you choose paving
Thomas comes out, measures the passage and the gate, works out what can be carried through and prices it in writing. The visit and the quote are free.