Lime Plastering is a specialist lime plastering contractor working throughout Torquay and the wider Devon area. As an established Devon town, Torquay has a large stock of pre-1919 property built from cob — walls that were designed to breathe. We restore them using traditional lime plaster, lime render and lime mortar, never cement or gypsum.
Sympathetic repair in Torquay means matching what is already there — the aggregate colour, the coat thickness, the texture of the original float finish. We take samples from the existing cob before mixing so new work sits alongside old rather than standing out.
Torquay and the villages around it retain a good deal of cob. Where that material is soft — as most traditional Devon 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.
Solid-wall buildings in Torquay were designed to absorb and release moisture. Lime keeps that cycle working; cement seals it in. That single difference explains why so many Devon homes develop damp after a modern refurbishment.
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 wet, wind-driven rain typical of the South West 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 Torquay property — the building types and problems vary, but the answer is always breathable lime rather than cement.
granite farmhouse — A granite farmhouse in Torquay where hard cement render had trapped moisture against cob. 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.
cob and thatch cottage — Cracked and cement-patched panels on a cob and thatch cottage in Devon. Failed infill was cut out, laths and staves renewed where rotten, and the panels made good in haired lime so the frame can move without splitting the finish.
limestone rectory — A commercial limestone rectory on a Torquay high street within a conservation area. Decayed render and mouldings were reinstated in lime, run in situ to the original profiles, and finished to match neighbouring frontages.
We do. Lime repointing is a large part of our Torquay workload — raking out hard cement pointing and replacing it with a softer, sacrificial lime mortar that protects the masonry face instead of eroding it.
External lime work is best carried out between spring and early autumn so it can carbonate before the first frosts. Internal lime plastering in Torquay can be done year-round with adequate heating and ventilation.
Lime cures slowly by carbonation. Allow roughly a week per coat as a guide, and longer in the wet, wind-driven rain typical of the South West. We protect the work and control drying so the finish cures evenly rather than cracking or dusting.
We do. Torquay is one of our core areas and we travel throughout Devon and the surrounding parts of South West England for lime plastering, lime render, lime pointing and heritage repair.
It depends on the wall and its exposure. For most Devon work we use hot-mixed lime with coarse local aggregate, built up in generous coats, stepping up to a more hydraulic lime only where exposure or the substrate genuinely demands it.
Our lime plastering, render and pointing teams also cover these towns and cities close to Torquay in Devon and the wider South West England area.
Browse all areas we cover across the UK
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