Traditional lime plastering in Newtownabbey and across County Antrim. Working on Victorian brick terraces and other solid-wall property, we specify hot-mixed lime, lime putty and natural hydraulic lime to suit each individual wall rather than applying one standard mix to everything.
Many properties in and around Newtownabbey sit within conservation areas or carry listed status, so finishes must match the original construction. We work regularly with County Antrim conservation officers and typically specify hot-mixed lime with local aggregate, wet-dashed or limewashed externally.
Newtownabbey and the villages around it retain a good deal of basalt and whinstone rubble. Where that material is soft — as most traditional County Antrim 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.
In persistently wet, mild Atlantic weather, an impermeable render is a liability: water gets in at cracks and reveals and then cannot leave. Lime render on a Newtownabbey wall handles that water, releasing it back out through the surface instead of pushing it deeper into the structure.
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 persistently wet, mild Atlantic weather 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 Newtownabbey property — the building types and problems vary, but the answer is always breathable lime rather than cement.
Victorian brick terrace — Weather-facing walls of a Victorian brick terrace taking the full force of persistently wet, mild Atlantic weather. We specified hot-mixed lime with local aggregate, wet-dashed or limewashed externally, built the render up in generous coats and protected the work while it carbonated to avoid shrinkage cracking.
whitewashed country cottage — Blown gypsum plaster and tide marks on the ground floor of a whitewashed country cottage in County Antrim. 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.
rubble-stone farmhouse — A rubble-stone farmhouse in Newtownabbey where hard cement render had trapped moisture against basalt and whinstone rubble. We stripped the render back to bare wall, allowed the masonry to dry, then rebuilt the finish in three coats of lime and limewashed it.
Lime cures slowly by carbonation. Allow roughly a week per coat as a guide, and longer in persistently wet, mild Atlantic weather. We protect the work and control drying so the finish cures evenly rather than cracking or dusting.
Yes, but it must be finished with a breathable product such as limewash, clay paint or mineral silicate paint. We advise on suitable finishes for each Newtownabbey project so breathability is not lost at the final coat.
We do. Lime repointing is a large part of our Newtownabbey workload — raking out hard cement pointing and replacing it with a softer, sacrificial lime mortar that protects the masonry face instead of eroding it.
We do. Newtownabbey is one of our core areas and we travel throughout County Antrim and the surrounding parts of Northern Ireland for lime plastering, lime render, lime pointing and heritage repair.
Our lime plastering, render and pointing teams also cover these towns and cities close to Newtownabbey in County Antrim and the wider Northern Ireland area.
Browse all areas we cover across the UK
Get a lime plastering quote in Newtownabbey