Plastering in Moordown
Ceilings, walls and a clean skim for the inter-war houses and flats around Wimborne Road, priced after we have seen what is under the paint.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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Plastering in Moordown is mostly work inside houses from the 1920s and 1930s: ceilings that have cracked or sagged, walls that sound hollow when you tap them, and rooms that need a clean skim after rewiring or a new kitchen. We find out what is behind the old plaster before we price, then make good, board or skim to suit it. For the outside walls, see rendering in Moordown.
Plaster problems in Moordown show up as bellied inter-war ceilings, walls chased for new wiring, and decades of Artex and woodchip. A bedroom ceiling in an inter-war semi off Wimborne Road has a crack running the length of the room and a slight belly in the middle. An electrician has chased new cables into every wall and left the house looking like a map. Or someone has bought a house that last changed hands decades ago and wants the swirled Artex, the woodchip and the patched walls gone before they decorate.
Thomas comes out, taps the walls, looks at the ceilings from underneath and from the loft where he can, and tells you which parts are sound enough to skim and which need to come off. Then you get a written itemised quote. The visit and the quote are free.
The work
Ceilings, walls and patching in inter-war houses
Ceilings first. A lot of Moordown's houses went up in the 1920s, when many ceilings were still lime plaster on timber lath and some builders were starting to use early boards. Lath and plaster that has lost its grip on the laths shows as a long crack and a sag.
If only a small area has let go, we can screw it back with plaster washers and skim. If the ceiling moves when you push it, it comes down, the laths are cleared and new plasterboard goes up, then tape and joint and a skim. A bedroom ceiling is usually two or three days including the mess.
Walls that sound hollow. Knock on an old Moordown wall and a dull note means the plaster has parted from the brick. Small blown patches are cut back to a firm edge and made good in bonding or hardwall, then skimmed. Where most of the wall rings hollow, taking it back to brick and floating it again with a backing coat is cheaper in the long run than patching patches.
Skimming. A two coat finish plaster over sound walls or new board, trowelled flat. It is the right answer after rewiring, after woodchip comes off and over old paint that has been keyed and sealed, with PVA or a bonding primer as the background needs. We will not skim over plaster that is loose, because the new coat pulls it off with it.
Artex. Textured ceilings from the 1970s and earlier can contain a small amount of asbestos. We have a sample tested before anyone sands or scrapes it. If it is clear, it can be skimmed over or taken down; if not, it is boarded over or removed by a licensed firm, and you decide with the facts in front of you.
Dry lining and stud walls. Plasterboard on a timber or metal stud for a new partition, or boards fixed dot and dab to a masonry wall where the old plaster is past saving and the room needs to be back in use quickly. We set angle beads on the corners and stop beads at the reveals so the edges stay straight.
Chimney breasts and openings. Where a breast has been removed or a fireplace blocked up, the patch is where cracks show later. We make sure the opening is vented and the new plaster is keyed into the old, not just laid on the surface.
The outside of the house. Pebbledash, sand and cement render and newer silicone thin coat or monocouche systems with a mesh basecoat and a topcoat are on our rendering page, because they are a different job.
When we would talk you out of it. If a wall is damp, plastering over it hides the problem for a season. Find out why first: a leaking gutter, a bridged damp course or condensation. We will say so rather than take the job.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Thomas Hannen does the visit and prices the job himself. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: protection and prep, how many coats, the area of each wall and ceiling, beads and stop ends, and disposal 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.
Plastering inside a house is maintenance and needs no planning permission. Moordown is not in a conservation area, but it has listed buildings, Old St John's Buildings on Wimborne Road among them, and inside a listed building old lime plaster and lath are part of what is protected, so we check the council listing records first. Replacing a whole ceiling is not normally building control work, though new partitions near a kitchen or stair can bring fire rules in, and we will tell you when an approved document applies.
Cost
What decides the price of a plastering job
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 small back bedroom in a Moordown inter-war semi, the stairwell of a three storey house, and a flat above a shop on Wimborne Road where every bag goes down a narrow stair are three different days of access. 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 for plastering in Moordown? 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.
If a ceiling has gone
A ceiling down, or plaster off a wall
Ring rather than use the form. A ceiling that is sagging, cracked in a line or dropping dust is the one thing here that will not wait, and nobody should be under it.
The first visit is about getting what is loose down safely and the room usable, and we quote the making good once we can see how far the failure goes. If a ceiling in an old Moordown house has dropped suddenly, turn off the lights in that room at the fuse board, because the cables often run just above it. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For anything urgent, ring rather than use the form, and if we cannot pick up we ring you back as soon as we can.
Worth knowing
Why a 1920s ceiling decides the price
Moordown grew fast between the wars. The farm land was sold off for estates, and the roads named for King George V's coronation, King George Avenue, Queen Mary Avenue and Coronation Avenue among them, filled up with houses through the 1920s and 1930s.
That was the decade builders moved from lime on lath towards gypsum plaster and board, and houses of the same age and the same road in Moordown can have either. You cannot tell from underneath once it has been painted a dozen times.
So we look before we price. From the loft, a lath ceiling shows as rows of thin timber strips with lumps of plaster pushed through between them; board shows as flat sheets nailed to the joists. The first is heavier, cracks in long lines and cannot be skimmed if the lumps have broken off. The second usually just needs its joints taped and a skim. Knowing which you have is the difference between a one day job and a three day one, and it is the first question to ask of any quote.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We are based in Boscombe, about two miles away, and plaster homes across BH9, in Moordown, Winton, Redhill and Ensbury Park, with BCP Council as the local authority. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. Before you book a visit in Moordown, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
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.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Moordown?
Most repairs in Moordown 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.
| Question | In Moordown |
|---|---|
| Who decides | BCP Council is the planning authority for Moordown. BCP Council's heritage pages set out what it controls. |
| Conservation area | None covers Moordown, so a like-for-like repair is ordinary maintenance. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Moordown. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | No National Park or National Landscape covers Moordown. |
Questions
Questions about plastering in Moordown
Can you skim over my old ceiling or does it need to come down?
If it is firm when you push it and the crack is a hairline, it can usually be screwed back where it needs it and skimmed. If it moves, sags or sounds hollow across a wide area, it comes down and is replaced with plasterboard. We check from the loft and from below at the free visit.
How long before I can paint new plaster?
Skim needs to dry to an even pale colour, often a week or so in a warm room and longer on a thick backing coat. Then a mist coat of watered down emulsion goes on first so the paint does not peel.
Will you make a mess of the house?
Plastering is dusty and wet, so floors are covered and doorways sheeted before we start. The room is swept every day and the waste leaves with us.
Can you plaster a room while we are living in the house?
Yes. We do one room at a time where we can and keep a way through, and the room is back in use as soon as the plaster is dry enough to walk past.
Nearby, and next door
Plastering near Moordown
Nearby places we also cover for plastering, with straight-line distances from Moordown, and the other trades we offer in Moordown itself.
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Plastering and rendering guides
Silicone, cement or lime: which render? Cracked render: which cracks matter Hollow-sounding wall: blown plaster or dot and dabEverything we do in Moordown Plastering, all areas Every area we cover
Free quote
Get a Moordown ceiling or wall looked at
Thomas taps the walls, checks the ceiling from the loft and prices the work line by line. The visit and the quote are free.