Plastering in Kinson

When a skim does the job. Where the old plaster is sound but cracked, patched or rough, it gets a PVA or bonding primer, then a two coat skim trowelled to a smooth finish coat. New angle bead goes on the external corners and a stop bead where the plaster meets a frame. Most rooms are a day to skim, and then need drying time before paint.

Walls taken back. Houses built in the late forties and fifties usually have a backing coat of sand and cement or an early gypsum browning on the block or brick, with a thin finish over it. Where that has gone hollow behind the surface, or blown around an old damp patch, we cut it back to something sound, put on a new float or hardwall backing coat, and finish over the top. Tap a wall and listen: a dead sound where the rest rings solid is the part that needs to come off.

Ceilings. Early post-war ceilings are mostly plasterboard with a skim, and the cracks follow the board edges because the joints were never taped. A ceiling that is sound gets scrimmed at the joints and skimmed. One that sags between the joists, or where the nails have rusted and the board has dropped, is better taken down and boarded again with new plasterboard, taped and skimmed.

Artex. A lot of ceilings in Kinson were textured in the sixties and seventies. Artex from before the mid eighties can contain asbestos, so we have it tested before anyone sands or scrapes it. If it is clear we can take the high points off and skim; if it is not, we board over it and skim, which leaves it sealed in and undisturbed.

Dry lining and extensions. A new stud partition, a lined garage conversion or the inside of a rear extension is plasterboard on studs or on dot and dab, with tape and joint or a full skim. On an outside wall in a bungalow, insulated plasterboard is often worth the extra, and that is a question for wall insulation in Kinson.

Making good. Chases from a rewire, holes where a boiler or a fireplace came out, reveals around new windows. We patch and bring it flush, and once it has dried a mist coat goes on before you decorate.

When we would talk you out of it. If a wall is damp, a new skim will blow again. Find the cause first, whether that is a gutter, a bridged damp course or a leaking pipe. Outside walls are a separate trade: rendering in Kinson covers pebbledash, sand and cement and silicone thin coat.

No rate per square metre, because two rooms of the same size can be a day apart once you have seen the walls.

Getting to it. A bungalow with every ceiling at one height, a semi with a stairwell ceiling over the landing, and a first floor flat in a council-built block with a shared stair each take a different set-up. Ceilings and stairwells need a platform, and a room you are still living in needs protecting rather than emptying. Where the work is at height the work at height rules apply just as they do on a roof.

What is behind it. Skimming over sound plaster is a different job from taking a wall back to brick, and you often cannot tell which you have until something is tapped. Lath and lime, old bonding, dot and dab and bare block all take different preparation and a different number of coats.

The awkward parts. Reveals, beads, stop ends, arches, curved walls and getting a flat finish where an old ceiling has dropped. The middle of a wall is quick. The edges are where the day goes.

Comparing quotes? Ask how many coats are included, whether the walls are being skimmed or taken back, whether beads and making good are in the price, and who moves and protects the furniture.

We plaster across Kinson in BH10 and BH11, from the village green on Wimborne Road out to Bear Cross and West Howe, and over to Northbourne and Ensbury Park, 3.7 miles from our base in Boscombe. BCP Council is the planning and building control authority.

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. Before you book a visit in Kinson, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Kinson 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.