Lime Plastering is a specialist lime plastering contractor working throughout Great Yarmouth and the wider Norfolk area. As a smaller Norfolk town with a high proportion of older property, Great Yarmouth has a large stock of pre-1919 property built from clay lump and cob — walls that were designed to breathe. We restore them using traditional lime plaster, lime render and lime mortar, never cement or gypsum.
Many properties in and around Great Yarmouth sit within conservation areas or carry listed status, so finishes must match the original construction. We work regularly with Norfolk conservation officers and typically specify lime putty with local pit sand, often finished with traditional pargetting.
Great Yarmouth and the villages around it retain a good deal of clay lump and cob. Where that material is soft — as most traditional Norfolk walling is — the mortar and plaster must always be softer than the masonry, so it wears sacrificially instead of eroding the stone or brick face.
Softness is the point. Traditional Norfolk walling of clay lump and cob is weaker than modern cement, so a hard mortar concentrates stress and moisture into the masonry face. Lime is deliberately the weaker material, and that is what makes it correct for Great Yarmouth's older homes.
Once the survey is agreed, we protect the site, strip back the failed finish, and apply lime in successive coats with proper curing between each. In the dry, cold easterly exposure of the eastern counties we control drying with damp hessian or sheeting so the work carbonates evenly rather than cracking.
The jobs below are typical of the work we carry out on Great Yarmouth property — the building types and problems vary, but the answer is always breathable lime rather than cement.
Georgian merchant's house — Peeling modern masonry paint on a Georgian merchant's house in Norfolk. The impermeable coating was removed, minor render defects were patched in lime, and the elevations were finished in several thin coats of limewash.
clay lump cottage — Blown gypsum plaster and tide marks on the ground floor of a clay lump cottage in Norfolk. We hacked off the gypsum, applied a haired lime base coat and a lime putty finish, and specified clay paint so the wall could keep drying.
pargetted timber-framed house — Sagging original ceilings in a pargetted timber-framed house near the centre of Great Yarmouth. Sound laths were retained and re-keyed, missing sections re-lathed in riven timber, and the ceiling made good with haired lime plaster to match the surviving profile.
Lime cures slowly by carbonation. Allow roughly a week per coat as a guide, and longer in the dry, cold easterly exposure of the eastern counties. We protect the work and control drying so the finish cures evenly rather than cracking or dusting.
Yes. We take samples of the surviving mortar or plaster from the clay lump and cob first, then match aggregate, colour and texture so the repair blends into the original rather than patching over it.
Every property is different, so we do not publish fixed prices. Cost depends on the substrate, the number of coats, access and whether failed cement has to be removed first. We survey the property in Great Yarmouth and provide a written, no-obligation quote.
Send us the details of your Great Yarmouth property through the contact form and we will arrange a free survey. You will receive a written specification and quote with no obligation to proceed.
Our lime plastering, render and pointing teams also cover these towns and cities close to Great Yarmouth in Norfolk and the wider East of England area.
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