Rendering in Post Green

Tapping and recording. Everything starts with a light hammer over every elevation. Hollow render has delaminated from the background and cannot be held on by a coating. We mark the areas, photograph them and measure them, and in a conservation area those photographs are also what a planning officer wants to see if consent is ever needed.

Like for like repairs. Where a wall is mostly sound, the right job is usually a repair rather than a replacement: cut out the loose, stabilise the backing, patch in with a matching mix, then re-dash or re-texture to blend. Done properly a patch disappears. Done badly it reads as a rectangle for the life of the wall, which is why the texture and the aggregate are matched on a sample before anyone starts.

Hacking off and rebuilding. Where a coat has gone we hack off to the background, clean down, cut out loose or spalled material and let the wall dry. Then beads: angle beads on corners, stop beads at reveals, a bellcast at the base to throw water clear. A primer or slurry key where the block is dense.

The systems, and where each belongs. Silicone thin coat, a mesh reinforced polymer basecoat under a flexible through-coloured topcoat, is our usual answer on the post-war cavity blockwork. Monocouche gives a single thick through-coloured coat on new blockwork and extensions. Traditional sand and cement, scratched and floated, still suits plinths, garages and boundary walls and takes paint, dry dash or Tyrolean.

Old walls, and why lime is not optional on them. The older houses around here are solid walled with no cavity. They have to dry through their own face, so a lime render and a mineral finish belong on them and a plastic-rich modern system does not. Wrap a breathing wall in something impermeable and the trapped moisture moves inside, which is where the damp patch at skirting level comes from.

Cracking, staining and algae. Fine crazing is shrinkage. A single crack out of a window corner is movement. Green and black streaking is algae and wants a wash. We tell you which of the three you are looking at before anyone quotes to re-render.

Render over external wall insulation. EWI board with a render carrier or a mesh basecoat is a real option on the newer houses, though on this land it changes the outward appearance of the building and so is a planning question as well as a thermal one.

No rate per square metre, because the square metres are the easy part; what is already on the wall decides the price.

Getting to it. A cottage on a lane, a detached house set back behind a verge and a farm outbuilding all need a different way in and a different platform. A bungalow gable comes off a tower, a three storey elevation wants a scaffold, and the platform has to stand for the whole system rather than a day. The work at height rules are why it is a priced line rather than something folded into a rate.

What is already on the wall. Rendering over sound brick is one job. Hacking off blown sand and cement, or a pebbledash that has parted from the background, is another, and it is the part nobody can see from the road. We tap the whole elevation before quoting, because the hollow areas set the hours.

The system, and what the wall behind it needs. Silicone thin coat over insulation, monocouche through-coloured, or traditional sand and cement all price differently and behave differently. On a solid wall that has to breathe, a plastic-rich modern system traps moisture and moves the problem inside, so the right system is a wall decision rather than a colour decision.

Comparing quotes? Ask which system is being quoted and how many coats, whether the old render is being hacked off or overlaid, whether beads, bellcast and stop ends are included, whether the scaffold is in the price, and what happens to the existing sills and pipework. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.

The thing people find surprising is which half of the job is controlled. Nobody is going to stop you repairing render that is failing. What the designation bites on is a change to the look of the building, and rendering is one of the specific alterations the regulations single out on this kind of land, alongside cladding in stone, timber, tiles and pebbledash.

In practice that means two conversations. If your wall is already rendered and you want it renewed in the same texture and a similar colour, you are doing maintenance and you can get on with it. If you want to take a dashed elevation back to a smooth modern finish, or to render brickwork that has always been brickwork, or to go from an off white to something strong, that is a change of appearance, and it wants a conversation with the planning department before a scaffold arrives rather than after.

What helps is evidence. We photograph the elevation as it stands, put a sample of the proposed texture and colour on the wall, and let you look at it in daylight against the neighbouring buildings. That sample is worth more than any brochure, both to you and to a planning officer, and it costs nothing to do at the survey stage. If the answer turns out to be a like for like repair, we will tell you that too.

We cover Post Green, Lytchett Minster, Upton, Lytchett Matravers and the BH16 addresses around them, 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.