The sleeper walls have been stripped out of the ground floor; the chimneys are down and we are installing hardcore, sand blinding and 300mm of EPS before casting the new concrete slab. We have installed a 600mm deep x 100mm thick strip of XPS (Extruded Polystyrene) to the inner face of all the internal masonry [...]

The roof is stripped of tiles, but we are leaving the felt and battens to provide weather protection until ready with the new membrane, insulation and roof covering. We need to extend the width of the roof at the sides (verges) and also at the gutterline (eaves) to “receive” the additional thickness of the EWI [...]

The scaffolding is up and we have made a start. As we will be installing 200mm of external wall insulation, the scaffold has to be erected in such a way that it can be easily modified to allow enough room to install the wall insulation and render at a later date. In practice, this means [...]

Being an architect, I have always wanted to build my own house. We all do! There is always something about an “off the peg” house which isn’t quite right – not enough light, poor flow, mean windows etc. The chance to design everything from scratch would be wonderful. The snag however, which is a common [...]