Plasterer in Durham
We plaster across Durham City and the villages around it: the stone and brick terraces of Gilesgate, Crossgate and Neville's Cross, the big estates of Newton Hall and Belmont, and the former pit villages at Brandon, Bowburn, Langley Moor and Sherburn. Reskims, float and set on bare walls, boarding, ceilings and artex, plus landlord turnarounds for the city's student houses. Fixed quotes, no travel charges, decorator-ready finish.
Plastering Durham homes
Durham's older houses, many of them student and professional lets, are plastered on solid stone and brick, often with lime, and the walls are rarely square. Skimming those well means working to the wall rather than fighting it: scrim on the cracks, bonding where the background is dusty, and a finish that is flat without pretending a 200-year-old wall is new. Landlords ask us for fixed-price, fixed-date work between tenancies, and that is how we quote it.
Newton Hall, Belmont, Framwellgate Moor and Pity Me are 1960s to 80s housing with artex ceilings and plasterboard walls that have taken forty years of wallpaper. The common jobs are skimming over artex, overboarding ceilings that have cracked along the board joints, and reskimming walls damaged by steamers and scrapers so they are smooth again. A room a day, cleaned and cleared.
In the villages the terraces were built quickly and plastered straight onto brick, and the bottom metre of many front rooms has been damaged by rising damp. We strip, treat and float and set those walls properly rather than skimming over the salts, and we do the boarding and skimming for the extensions and loft conversions that are common in Brandon, Bowburn and Ushaw Moor.
Parts of Durham we cover
We work across the whole of Durham and the streets around it, including Gilesgate, Framwellgate Moor, Newton Hall, Belmont, Neville's Cross, Brandon, Bowburn, Langley Moor, Sherburn, Pity Me, Ushaw Moor, Carrville and Meadowfield. There are no travel charges anywhere in County Durham.
Skimming Durham homes
The city's older houses have walls that were never square and plaster that has been patched for generations. A good skim works with that: scrim on the cracks, bonding agent on dusty or painted backgrounds, and a finish that is flat and smooth without trying to make a 200-year-old wall look like new plasterboard. We do a lot of this between tenancies in Gilesgate, the Viaduct and Crossgate.
Newton Hall, Belmont, Framwellgate Moor and Pity Me have artex ceilings and plasterboard walls from the 60s to 80s. Light artex is sealed and skimmed in a day; heavy or cracked ceilings are overboarded and skimmed. Never sanded, because older coatings can contain asbestos.
In Brandon, Bowburn, Langley Moor and Sherburn the terraces often have salt damage along the bottom of front rooms from old damp, and that is treated and replastered rather than skimmed over. Everything above it, and the extensions and loft rooms common in the villages, is skimmed to a paint-ready finish.
How we do plastering
The full process, step by step, and what it involves.
location_onOur Durham guide
The homes in Durham and the problems they tend to have.
photo_libraryCase studies
Real jobs written up: the problem, the work and the result.
menu_bookGetting your home ready for a plasterer
Our guide, written for homeowners.
Our promise
If a wall or ceiling we plastered is not right, we come back and sort it. We prepare the background properly and use the right plaster for it, which is why that rarely happens.
Plasterer jobs we have written up
A garage room skimmed ready for paint
A converted garage room, 15ft by 7ft, skimmed across up to five walls and ceilings and left ready for painting.
A second job in Blyth after a kitchen we plastered
A customer in Blyth had us back for a second job after we plastered their kitchen, and trusted us to get on with it while they went out.
Rated by customers across the North East on Checked & Vetted, MyBuilder and Google. Read the reviews.
Plasterer questions from Durham
Yes, we do a lot of work between tenancies. We visit early, give you a fixed price and a fixed start date, and plan the job to finish with drying time left before the new tenants arrive. Skimmed walls need a few weeks before full painting, so if your window is tight we will tell you what can be painted with a mist coat in time and what is better left.
It can, if hard gypsum or cement is put straight onto a wall that was built to breathe. Moisture then gets trapped in the stone and the plaster blows. On older stone and brick in Durham we look at what is already there and use lime or breathable systems where the wall needs them, then finish smooth. We explain the choice on the visit.
After the structure is up, the roof is on, windows are in, and the first fix electrics and plumbing are done, but before second fix and kitchen fitting. That is when we board and skim, or float and set new blockwork. If you tell us your builder's programme, we will book in to suit it, and we can do the making good where the extension meets the old house.
More of what we do in Durham
Need plastering in Durham?
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