A whole house renovation runs several trades against one programme, and the structural work has to happen in the right order or it gets done twice. We survey, appoint a structural engineer where the job needs one, coordinate the building control application and inspections, and run the trades to a written programme. We do not produce structural calculations ourselves. Below are the Beaconsfield specifics worth settling before the first wall comes down.
Beaconsfield is two settlements of different dates
The railway reached Beaconsfield in 1906 and led to the creation of Beaconsfield New Town north of the historic core, leaving the Old Town relatively free of 20th century expansion. A renovation in one is a different building problem from a renovation in the other, and the age of the fabric sets the order of work.
The council's appraisal states that the standing buildings on the west side of Park Lane were all built in the 20th century. It describes the houses to the north as early 20th century Arts and Crafts, using red brick, plain clay tile roofs, pebbledash or roughcast and applied black and white timbering. At Hampden Hill the palette is yellow stock brick walls, black stained weatherboarding, white timber doorways and bargeboards, and grey concrete tiled roofs. Materials like those govern what a repair has to match.
Malthouse Square is a documented scheme with a known plan form
Its houses are recorded in the council's appraisal. Beaconsfield Urban District Council resolved in December 1919 to erect 52 houses at Malthouse Square, and records show the houses were ready for occupation in October 1921. The square was laid out with 52 houses of six different types, and every one of them has a ground floor plus an attic storey.
A ground floor and an attic storey is a plan form with consequences for head height, roof structure and stair position, all of which limit what a renovation can do upstairs. The appraisal also states that plain clay roof tiles are ubiquitous in the historic core, and that concrete roof tiles at Malthouse Square have a negative impact on character. Roof covering is a conservation question there as well as a cost.
The ground changes between the Old Town and the station
British Geological Survey 1:50,000 mapping shows the bedrock beneath the Beaconsfield Old Town Conservation Area as Lambeth Group, classified as clay, silt and sand. Beneath Beaconsfield station and the New Town roads north of it, the same mapping shows Seaford Chalk Formation and Newhaven Chalk Formation, undifferentiated.
Clay and chalk behave differently under a new foundation, a widened opening or an underpinned wall. The town is mapped in detail: the British Geological Survey 1:50,000 sheet covering it, sheet 255 for England and Wales, is itself titled Beaconsfield. We read what is mapped and then open a trial hole, because a map is a starting point rather than an answer.
Surface water has reached several Beaconsfield roads before
The Chiltern and South Bucks Strategic Flood Risk Assessment records county council data showing flooding on several Beaconsfield roads over winter 2013 to 2014, including Penn Road, Howe Drive, Warwick Road, Station Road, Reynolds Road and Shepherd's Lane. That is recorded road flooding rather than a flood zone designation.
The same assessment records the Beaconsfield urban extension option site as lying entirely within Flood Zone 1. Where a renovation involves new floor levels, a lowered floor or a rear addition, the existing drainage and the external ground levels are worth checking at survey stage. We record what is there and tell you if it changes the design.
- Room by room programme so you can stay in the house
- First and second fix sequenced around a realistic decorating date
- Damp treatment, tanking and timber repairs
- External rendering, repointing and masonry repair
- Cornice, skirting and period feature restoration
Trusted Home Renovation in Beaconsfield
Beaconsfield is about 20.4 miles from our base in Potters Bar. That is a stretch for us, so it is work we travel for: whole house renovations, extensions and structural projects rather than an hour of small repairs. We would rather say that plainly than pretend we can be round in twenty minutes. What you get for the distance is one contractor running the structural engineer, the building control application with Buckinghamshire Council, the inspections and every trade to one written programme, with one point of contact throughout. We coordinate engineers and build to their calculations, and we never produce those calculations ourselves. GS Renovation Ltd is fully insured, registered in England, company number 14611254, and rated 4.9 from 31 reviews on MyBuilder.
- Paperwork and certificates handed over for when you sell
- Honest updates if a date or a detail has to move
- A snagging list agreed and worked through before handover
- A whole-house programme sequenced so no trade doubles back
- Room by room handover so you can move back in stages
- Waste cleared as we go, not left piled in the garden