Stone & brick masonry · Corbham Cross · every wall counted since 1978
The walls are numbered. So is the work.
Hallowbank repoints in natural hydraulic lime the brick can breathe through, hangs veneer on 316 stainless the framing can rely on, and rebuilds arches on centering the geometry approves of. Every elevation we touch gets a yard number — the figures below are read straight out of that book.
Pointing season runs April to October — lime carbonates against the calendar, not the thermostat. Surveys, chips and emergency make-safes happen year-round; the spring rake list fills by mid-March.
What we do
The three trades
Lime repointing, by the book
Joints raked by hand to twice their width and flushed full in two passes with NHL 3.5 matched to the chip from your own wall — NHL 5 at copings and parapets. When the scaffold leaves, the elevation is signed into the yard book: joint count, lime batch, strike date. In 2041 that line is the whole argument.
Veneer, hung to outlast us
Full-bed and thin stone on 316 stainless Z-anchors and dowel pins at sixteen inches on centre, over a two-layer weather barrier with base flashing and weep vents. Anchors, flashing and weeps are on the drawing with numbers attached — because a veneer wall is a roofing decision wearing a stone coat.
Arches, on centering
Timber centering bent to the drawn curve, voussoirs numbered and laid from both spring lines, keystone set last, centering struck only after the ring closes. Ninety-six arches rebuilt this way and counting — the ninety-seventh is on the drawing board now.
Before the gallery
Straight answers, early
We put the questions here instead of at the bottom of the page, because they decide whether you ring at all — and the answers are the same ones we give standing in the yard.
Lime or portland — honestly?
In a wall built before 1930, lime, and not as a preference: lime is softer than the brick and sacrificial, weathering out so the brick does not. Portland is stronger than old brick, so winter breaks the brick to save the mortar — exactly backwards, and the bill arrives five years later as spalling.
What does the yard number get me?
Evidence. When a joint needs attention in a decade, the yard book says what was raked, what was pointed, which lime batch and why — the repair starts from the page instead of from archaeology. Buyers’ surveyors have started asking for it by name.
How does an arch rebuild work?
Centering is the temporary timber frame that carries the stones while the ring is open; it comes out only after the keystone is set and the mortar has taken. The voussoirs are numbered on the ground and laid from both spring lines toward the crown — geometry holds the arch, we keep it company while it closes.
How long does repointing take?
A day of raking per two hundred square feet, then repointing at the same pace — a typical 1,500-square-foot elevation runs two to three weeks with scaffolding. Hand work is the pace; a grinder is faster and ruins the wall you called us to save.
Recent work
The yard book, in pictures
Six numbered walls from around Corbham Cross — every caption carries its yard-book entry. Ask on the phone and we will read you the whole line, batch numbers and all.
How it goes
Number, rake, point, sign
The same sequence on every job — the only variable is your project.
Visit one
The survey & the number
The elevation is photographed, measured and entered in the yard book; a mortar chip leaves an inconspicuous joint and is matched. You keep a written square-foot price, held sixty days — the wall’s age sets the lime, the chip sets the colour.
Week 1
Rake & record
Scaffolding up, sheets down, joints raked by hand to twice their width and vacuumed, depth checked joint by joint. Every raked course is ticked in the yard book as it is done — the wall and the record agree, or we stop.
Weeks 2–4
Point in two passes
NHL 3.5 in the field, NHL 5 at copings, the first pass stiffened before the second, struck to the profile the wall was born with and brushed at leather-hard so the joint reads old from across the street.
Week 6
Sign & warrant
Carbonation finished under mist and covers, the entry is signed into your name with the twenty-five-year warranty, and a copy of the page goes with the invoice — the wall’s biography, countersigned.
The quote arrived with a yard-book number on it, which I assumed was theatre until our surveyor telephoned them three years later about a damp patch. They read the page out loud, we found the patch was a gutter, and I became a customer for life in four minutes.
Ninety-six arches, they told us, and ours was the ninety-fifth. The voussoirs arrived numbered like a crate of violins. The centering came out on the Thursday and the keystone has not moved a hair that the plumb line can find.
Every other bid said “stone cladding”. Hallowbank said “anchors, flashing and weeps, and here is the spacing”, and the drawing said the same. Three winters of westerlies and the veneer reads quarried, not hung.
Twenty-five years, page-backed
If a joint we pointed fails, an anchor we set lets go, or an arch we rebuilt settles inside twenty-five years, we return and correct it free. The yard-book page tells us exactly what was done — which is why the promise can be this plain.
walls@hallowbank.example · Corbham Cross · surveys year-round
Put your wall in the book.
Year built, what is failing, and a photo if you can manage one. The survey visit brings the chip kit and a written square-foot number inside the week — and the yard-book entry starts the day you say go.