Rendering in Lymington, painted render and stucco
On an older frontage here the render is part of the listed fabric rather than a coating on it, and that changes both what may be done to it and what may go on top.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
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Rendering in Lymington runs from re-rendering post-war houses in silicone or monocouche to repairing painted render and stucco on the old frontages. There are 160 listed entries here, and where one carries painted render, the render is listed fabric: cracked or blown areas are repaired like for like in lime, with consent, and painted in a breathable finish. For inside walls, see plastering in Lymington.
That is worth knowing before anyone quotes, because a few streets away the position is different. Much of the housing in Lymington dates from the 1980s onwards, and on a modern cavity wall a through coloured thin coat is a sensible choice. A job ten minutes away in Lymington can be entirely different work.
So we start with the Lymington address, then the wall. We tap the elevation to find what has blown, look at the existing finish and what it has been painted with, and put the access, the preparation, the system, the beads and the making good on separate lines of a written quote. The site visit and the quote are free.
The work
Painted frontages, blown patches and modern elevations
Tapping the wall comes first. On a Lymington house, sound render rings hard, blown render sounds hollow and has parted from the background. On an old painted frontage the hollow areas sit under a sill, beside a downpipe or along the base, wherever water has been running for years.
Repairing painted lime render. Cutting the failed area out, squaring the edges, dampening the background and rebuilding in matching lime coats, then finishing to the same texture and colour. Done properly a patch on a painted frontage disappears. Done in cement it stands proud, stays a different colour and pulls the surrounding render off within a few winters.
What the frontage gets painted with. This is where most of the harm is done. A modern plastic masonry paint puts a film over a breathable wall, so the moisture that used to leave through the face is trapped and the paint blisters and takes the render with it. Limewash or a mineral based breathable paint keeps the wall working.
Getting old cement off. Where a period Lymington wall has been wrapped in a hard cement render, it cracks, lets water behind and will not let it out. We hack it off by hand rather than with a breaker, clean down and stabilise the background, and let the wall dry before anything new goes on.
Silicone thin coat. On the modern cavity walled housing in Lymington this is what we would fit. A stabilising primer where the background is dusty, a mesh reinforced basecoat, then a through coloured silicone topcoat that sheds rain, cleans down easily and never needs painting.
Monocouche. One thick through coloured coat, ruled off and scraped back to an even texture. Hard wearing on a plain elevation, and it wants a stable background and planned day joints so no seam shows across a front wall.
Sand and cement, pebbledash and Tyrolean. Still ordinary work on the interwar and post-war houses. Scratch coat, float coat, and dash or Tyrolean matched by sample panel where the aggregate can still be got.
Beads, bellcast and stop ends. Bellcast at the base so water is thrown clear, stop beads at reveals and eaves, angle beads on corners. Close to the water in Lymington we use stainless rather than galvanised, because a galvanised bead in salt air rusts and bleeds a brown line through the finish.
External wall insulation. Board fixed outside and rendered over, on a render carrier where the background will not take a direct fix, lifting the thermal performance without losing a room. It changes the wall thickness and every reveal, so it belongs on modern housing rather than a listed frontage.
Cracks, delamination and staining. A straight hairline crack across a panel is shrinkage. One that steps or widens is movement behind the render, and frost then opens it further. Spalled brick behind an old cement skin gets cut out. Algae and green on a shaded elevation lift with a gentle clean down and a treatment rather than a pressure washer.
How it runs
Re-rendering a frontage, from scaffold to top coat
Thomas goes along the wall tapping it, listening for the dull note of render that has let go, and works out what it is stuck to.
In Lymington that tends to be a painted sand and cement front on an older house off the High Street, pebbledash or a render panel on a post-war semi, or the gable of a bungalow that faces the south westerly weather. Your quote splits out scaffold and access, protecting windows and paths, preparing the old surface, the render system with its coats, the beads and stop ends, and making good.
Thomas stays your contact on a Lymington job while it is taken back, prepared and rendered. Each coat has to cure before the next goes on, so the scaffold stays for the whole job, and the wall is sheeted in rain or strong sun. Sills, pipes and steps are masked off, the ground is swept every night, and the old render goes away with us. Should hacking off expose cracked brick or a failed lintel, you are shown photographs and given a price before we render over anything.
The same finish put back is maintenance. Changing how the outside looks is a planning matter, as the Planning Portal explains. Appearance is controlled in the Lymington conservation area, which takes in the historic town centre, so a new colour or finish on a street elevation needs checking with New Forest District Council. A listed building needs consent under the listed buildings legislation, and renewing a whole elevation also brings building control in. All of that is checked at the quote stage.
Cost
Hollow patches, render systems and scaffold time
Nobody can honestly price render by the square metre until they know what is on the wall and what the wall is made of.
Stripping. Going over sound brick in Lymington is quick. Old sand and cement that has blown, or pebbledash that has come off its background, has to be knocked off and skipped, and the hollow patches marked when we tap the wall decide the hours.
The system. A silicone thin coat, a through-coloured monocouche and a traditional sand and cement finish sit at different prices and behave differently. A pre-1919 solid wall has to breathe, so lime is usually the right render there; a plastic-rich finish on it traps moisture and moves the damp indoors. Putting insulation behind the render is another system again.
Weather. South west faces take the hardest driving rain in Lymington, so the bellcast above the damp course, the beads, and the stop ends around windows are where the detail counts.
Platforms. A Lymington terraced front on the pavement, a semi with a side gate and a detached house with a conservatory across the back all need different scaffolding. The work at height rules set the kit, so it has its own line.
Questions for another renderer: which system and how many coats, is the old render coming off or being covered, and are the scaffold, beads and sills included.
If it has started to come away
Render that sounds hollow or has cracked wide open
Tap the render near the damaged part. A hollow sound, or a crack you could slide a coin into, means rain is already behind it and a hard frost will prise off more. Keep people away from anything loose over a path, the pavement or the front door.
Ring us instead of using the form. We take down anything loose on that first visit, put a sheet over the wall if more rain is forecast, and price the elevation once the extent of the blown area is clear. On a painted period frontage in the centre, a blown patch usually means water has been sitting behind the paint for a long while. Rendering is booked Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. When we cannot answer, we call back as soon as we are off the scaffold.
Worth knowing
The paint on an old render matters as much as the render
Most people think of paint as decoration and render as the real job. On a period wall it is the other way round. A traditional painted render lets moisture pass through it, and the limewash or breathable paint on top was chosen to do the same. The system works as a whole: water gets in, water gets back out, the wall stays sound.
Put a modern plastic masonry coating over that and you have sealed the face. The moisture that used to leave through the render is trapped behind a film and comes out where it can: blistering paint, a dark patch inside, or render coming off in sheets. It shows on frontages that stood for a hundred and fifty years and failed within a decade of being repainted. So ask what is going on the wall as well as what is going under it, and if a quote never mentions breathability, that tells you something.
Who you are dealing with
The renderer covering Lymington and the marshes
From Boscombe, where we are based, the drive to Lymington is 12.5 miles. Our rendering work covers the town, Pennington, Woodside, Buckland and the lanes towards the marshes, across SO41, which New Forest District Council looks after.
The firm is Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719. Thomas Hannen, the owner, taps your walls, looks at the finish and prices the render himself. We carry a verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. Neither the visit nor the itemised written quote costs you anything. Before you book a visit in Lymington, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.
Planning at a glance
Do you need planning permission in Lymington?
Most repairs in Lymington 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 Lymington |
|---|---|
| Who decides | New Forest District Council is the planning authority for Lymington. The National Park boundary runs close by, and the Park's property map shows which side an address falls. |
| Conservation area | Yes: Lymington Conservation Area. Check whether your street is inside the boundary before changing anything visible. |
| Listed buildings | Yes, there are listed buildings in and around Lymington. If yours is one, work can need listed building consent. |
| Protected landscape | No National Park or National Landscape covers Lymington. |
Questions
Questions about rendering in Lymington
Is the render on a listed building covered by the listing?
Yes. The listing covers the building, and a render that forms part of its external fabric goes with it. Taking it off, replacing it with a different material or changing its appearance are works needing consent, so the address gets checked before anything is priced.
What paint should go on an old render?
Limewash or a mineral based breathable paint. The point of a traditional render is that moisture can pass through it, and a plastic masonry coating seals that route. The paint then blisters, and when it comes away it takes render with it.
Our house is 1980s. Do any of these restrictions apply?
Almost certainly not: on a modern cavity walled house away from the historic core, a through coloured silicone thin coat or a monocouche is an ordinary choice and the finish is yours. We still check the address, because it takes a minute and it saves a great deal of trouble.
Can a cement patch on an old frontage be left alone?
It can be left, but it will keep causing trouble. Cement is harder and less absorbent than the render round it, so water is pushed into the softer material either side and that is where the next failure appears. Cutting it out and patching in lime stops the cycle.
Does being near the water change the beads you use?
Yes. Salt air corrodes galvanised beads from the coating inwards, and the rust bleeds a brown line through the finish within a few years. We specify stainless on elevations facing the water, and cut out any corroded fixings we find while the render is off.
Nearby, and next door
Rendering near Lymington
Nearby places we also cover for rendering, with straight-line distances from Lymington, and the other trades we offer in Lymington itself.
Rendering nearby
Our other trades in Lymington
Rendering guides
Silicone, cement or lime: which render? Cracked render: which cracks matter Listed building consent for repointing and re-renderingBuilders in Lymington: all our building work Everything we do in Lymington Rendering, all areas Every area we cover
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Have the address checked before the finish is chosen
Thomas looks up whether the building is listed, taps the elevation, and prices the repair or the system with the access, beads and making good itemised. The visit and the quote are free.