Plasterer in Hockley Heath

Hockley Heath is a village in the far south of Solihull borough, strung along the Stratford Road (A3400) with the Stratford-upon-Avon Canal running behind the houses on one side and open green belt fields on the other. It grew up as a horse-changing stop on the road between Birmingham and Stratford, gained a canal wharf at the end of the eighteenth century, and became a commuter village in the twentieth. Most homes are detached houses and bungalows from the 1930s onwards, many extended more than once, with older cottages and farmhouses out on the lanes towards Nuthurst, Illshaw Heath and Umberslade. RCR Connections Ltd is Birmingham based, covering the whole of the Midlands, and our plastering and rendering work reaches Hockley Heath and the villages around it.

This guide is for anyone living here or are about to buy here. It walks through how the village came to look the way it does, the house types you find on each stretch, what tends to go wrong with walls and ceilings in each of them, and how we approach the work, from patching one ceiling to boarding and skimming a whole extended bungalow.

Free, no-obligation quote in Hockley Heath: WhatsApp me on 07453 614095 with a few photos, or send us a message.

Hocca’s hill and the heath

Where the name comes from

The usual explanation is that the high ground north of Nuthurst was known as Hocca’s hill, after an Anglo-Saxon landowner, and that the open common below it became the heath. By 1280 the place was written as “Huckeloweheath”, and by the sixteenth century it had become “Hokeley Heath”. The same personal name may lie behind other Hockleys in the old county of Warwickshire, including the one in Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter, though nobody can prove a link.

For centuries the heath was exactly that: rough grazing between farms that had been cleared out of the Forest of Arden. Nobody lived on it in any number. The farms that did exist were scattered across the parishes of Tanworth, Packwood and Lapworth, and their timber-framed houses are still dotted around the lanes today.

Nuthurst, the older neighbour

The hamlet of Nuthurst, at the southern end of the modern village, is the older name. It comes from the Old English for “nut wood”, and a woodland called Hnuthyrste is mentioned with Shottery in an early grant to Worcester Cathedral, usually dated to around 705. A chapel dedicated to St Peter stood at Nuthurst from at least the early thirteenth century as an outpost of Hampton-in-Arden. By 1820 a painting showed it in ruins. Only the graveyard and a small nineteenth-century mortuary chapel survive, close to the M40.

Aylesbury House

The Aylesbury family settled in the area in the fourteenth century, and their house, later known as Aylesbury House, stands north of the road towards Packwood. The county history describes it as a large mid to late eighteenth-century red-brick house of three storeys, with two full-height bay windows, a stone-framed doorway, stone keystones over the windows and a moulded stone eaves cornice. It spent many years as a hotel. In 2016 a fire gutted much of the interior, and the shell has since been turned into apartments with new houses in the grounds. It is a reminder that even in a small village, a single building can carry three centuries of different construction methods.

The road, the inns and the post

A staging post on the Stratford Road

Hockley Heath owes its existence as a village to the road. The Stratford Road and the Old Warwick Road meet here, and in the coaching age the village became a place to change horses and sort post for a wide area south of Birmingham. A large house called Hockley House became a coaching inn, with the Nag’s Head opposite keeping the post horses. Local accounts say Princess Victoria stayed at Hockley House in 1837, perhaps on the way to Packwood House, though that is tradition rather than record. Hockley House itself was pulled down in 1968, and housing now stands on the site.

What the coaching age left behind

The legacy of that period is mainly the shape of the place rather than the buildings. Houses line both sides of the main road for well over a kilometre, rather than gathering round a green or a church. The pubs and restaurants along the road, some with older cores and many later additions, still give the Stratford Road its character. One of them, the Barn, has a listed building at its heart with newer wings built round it after a fire in 1998.

From our point of view, buildings like these are a patchwork. You can stand in one room and touch lime plaster on old brick, then step through a doorway into a 1990s extension finished in gypsum on plasterboard. Getting the two to meet neatly, without a crack line opening along the joint a year later, is a large part of the job.

Hockley Port and the canal

The cut arrives

The Stratford-upon-Avon Canal was built south from King’s Norton and was navigable as far as Hockley Heath by around 1798. For several years the village was effectively the end of the line, and a wharf known as Hockley Port grew up to serve it. The rest of the route to Stratford was finished by 1816. Boats brought in coal, coke, stone, lime, bricks, salt, cement and timber, and the last commercial load is said to have arrived on Christmas Eve 1929. Today the wharf is part of a pub, and the canal is used by leisure boats and walkers.

Why the canal matters for plaster

Two things about the canal are worth knowing if your house backs onto it. First, lime and brick for local building came in by water for well over a century, so houses built here in the nineteenth century were often finished with lime plaster made from that supply. Second, houses close to the water and the cutting tend to sit in damper air. Garden walls, back extensions and outbuildings near the towpath often show more green growth, more salt staining and more blown render than the same buildings further from the water. That is not always a damp problem inside the house, but it is something we look at before deciding what goes on the walls.

No station, plenty of traffic

Hockley Heath never had a railway station. Residents have always used stations in neighbouring villages, and the main road and, later, the motorways did the work instead. Junction 4 of the M42 is a short drive north, and the M40 passes to the south. That accessibility is what turned the village into a commuter base after the Second World War.

Church, school and institute

A chapel and a school in the 1830s

Until the late 1830s Hockley Heath had neither a church nor a school of its own. Edward Bolton King, the MP who lived at Umberslade, gave land for a chapel and a school. The old school building still stands near the end of School Road and is now in office use.

St Thomas’s church

In 1878 a new ecclesiastical parish, Nuthurst cum Hockley Heath, was formed, taking in the growing village from Tanworth. The church of St Thomas was built in 1879 to designs by John Cotton, in red brick in the Early English style, and consecrated in 1880. The dedication is said to honour Thomas Burman of Warings Green, the main subscriber, who laid the foundation stone. Victorian church interiors like this one were usually plastered in lime with a hard, polished finish, and the houses built in the village at the same time used similar methods.

The institute and the school

The industrialist and politician G. F. Muntz, who lived at Umberslade Hall, also paid for a village institute in 1892, now known as the King George VI Memorial Hall. A new council school for 120 pupils opened in 1913, and the school is now Hockley Heath Primary Academy. The recreation ground on the Old Warwick Road followed in the 1920s, after fundraising led by Harry Mould of Hockley House, including the raffle of a car.

The wartime airfield

During the Second World War a small airfield, RAF Hockley Heath, operated on the Stratford Road opposite Box Trees Farm between 1941 and 1948. The land went back to farming. Box Trees Farm is now an arts and crafts centre, and its farmhouse and barn are listed.

The house file: what you find on each stretch

Hockley Heath does not have one typical house. These are the main types we see, and the work each usually needs.

Farmhouses and cottages on the lanes

Out on the lanes, and in Nuthurst and around Umberslade, there are farmhouses that go back to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The county history describes several of them across the surrounding parishes: L-shaped and T-shaped plans, timber framing hidden behind later brick or roughcast, wide fireplaces and open-timbered ceilings with chamfered beams. Monkspath Hill Farm, on the road north towards Birmingham, has a gable stone dated 1691 and another dated 1810, showing how each generation added to the house. Many of these buildings were roughcast in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to keep the weather out of the frame.

Typical jobs:

• Repairing lime plaster on walls and ceilings where it has come away from laths or panels.
• Replacing gypsum patches that have trapped moisture against old brick or timber.
• Matching the soft, slightly uneven surface of the original plaster rather than flattening it.
• Lime render or roughcast repairs on gable ends and outbuildings.

Victorian and Edwardian houses near the church

A modest number of houses along the main road and near St Thomas’s were built in the second half of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth. Most have solid brick walls, sash windows and lath and plaster ceilings, often with a later layer of board or Artex over the top. Over time, the original lime has been patched with whatever was to hand during rewiring, new heating and new kitchens.

Typical jobs:

• Overboarding sagging lath and plaster ceilings, or taking them down and reboarding where they are beyond saving.
• Re-plastering walls in breathable materials after damp-proofing work or the removal of old cement render.
• Making good around removed chimney breasts and fireplaces.
• Running in a short length of plain cornice where a section has been lost.

Inter-war houses on the Stratford Road

From the 1920s and 1930s, Hockley Heath began to fill in along the main road with detached houses on large plots. Many have rendered or pebble-dashed upper floors, bay windows, tiled porches and tall chimneys. Inside, walls are usually brick with sand and lime or early gypsum backing coats, and the ceilings are lath and plaster or early plasterboard. These houses are solid but nearly a hundred years old, and most have been altered several times.

Typical jobs:

• Skimming walls that have been patched so often the surface is uneven under paint.
• Overboarding cracked ceilings, especially in bedrooms under the roof.
• Repairing or replacing the render on upper storeys and bays.
• Boarding and skimming knock-throughs between front and back rooms.

Post-war bungalows and chalet bungalows

Bungalows are a big part of the village. Put up in the decades after the war on generous plots, many have since been raised into chalet bungalows or full two-storey homes, with dormers added to the front and back. Each extension brings new plasterboard, new ceilings and new joints against the old walls.

Typical jobs:

• Boarding and skimming new dormer rooms, including sloping ceilings and awkward eaves.
• Skimming old textured ceilings once they have been tested for asbestos.
• Making good where internal walls have been taken out to open up the living space.
• Dealing with cracks at the line where the old ceiling meets the new.

Cul-de-sacs of the 1970s, 80s and 90s

A few small developments off the main road, including some on the site of Hockley House, date from the later twentieth century. These are brick and block cavity houses, usually dry-lined, with the boards stuck to the blockwork on dabs of adhesive. Typical faults are nail pops, cracked joints, hollow-sounding walls and patches of damage from years of fixings.

New homes and conversions

Recent years have brought new houses in the grounds of older buildings, apartments within older shells and conversions of barns and outbuildings. New-build interiors usually go up quickly, and small cracks at board joints are common in the first couple of years as the structure settles and dries out. Barn conversions bring their own problems: thick walls that need careful insulation, exposed timbers that have to be worked round, and owners who want a finish that suits the building rather than a flat modern skim.

Projects we help with in Hockley Heath

Extensions and dormers

Raising a bungalow, adding a rear kitchen extension or building out over a garage are among the most common projects in the village. Once the builder has finished the structure, we board and skim walls and ceilings, form neat reveals around windows and doors, and finish the corners with beads so they stay straight. Where the new work joins the old house, we tape and reinforce the joint, because that line is where movement shows first.

Open-plan kitchens and living rooms

Removing a wall between kitchen and dining room is usually followed by a new steel beam, boxing in and a large expanse of ceiling that needs to look like one surface. We overboard or skim the whole ceiling where possible rather than patching only the strip where the wall stood, so the light falls evenly across it and there is no ghost of the old wall.

Loft rooms and garage conversions

Loft conversions under the steep roofs of inter-war houses, and garage conversions on wider plots, need insulated plasterboard, careful detailing round rooflights and sometimes fire-rated boards. We work to the specification your builder or building control has agreed, and we can recommend board types if no one has.

Home offices and garden rooms

More and more households want a home office, either in a spare bedroom or in a new garden building. A well-plastered room with a smooth finish makes a small office feel calmer, and in timber garden buildings we can board and skim over the frame so the inside feels like an extension of the house.

Getting a house ready to sell

Hockley Heath houses tend to sell on condition and space. Before a sale, owners often want cracked ceilings, stained patches and old textured coatings dealt with so a buyer sees a clean, finished house. A few days of plastering in the main rooms shows in the estate agent’s photos.

Rendering on the Stratford Road

What is already on the walls

The houses along the main road carry a mix of finishes: smooth painted sand and cement, pebble-dash and spar dash from the middle of the twentieth century, roughcast on older cottages and modern coloured renders on newer houses. Many are now patched and cracked, with paint flaking off and hollow areas where the render has lost its grip on the brick.

What we apply

We apply sand and cement render, K-Rend monocouche and silicone systems, and lime render where the building needs it. Through-coloured systems such as K-Rend monocouche and silicone do not need painting and shed water well, which suits houses that face the weather across open fields. On older buildings, a lime render is usually the better choice because it lets the wall dry out. Our rendering in Solihull page covers the systems in more detail.

Before re-rendering

Old render has to be checked first. If it is hollow over large areas, it is better to take it off and start again than to coat over it. Where render runs below the damp-proof course or bridges it, we make sure the new coat finishes above it. If you live in a listed building, or are unsure whether your plans need permission, check with the council before work starts.

Problems we see in Hockley Heath homes

Cracked and sagging ceilings

The problem owners most often send us photos of is a ceiling that has cracked along the joists or started to dip. In lath and plaster, that usually means the nibs of plaster behind the laths have snapped. In older plasterboard, it often means the board was nailed too far apart or has been loaded from above. We look at the ceiling from below and, where possible, from the loft before deciding whether it can be overboarded or needs to come down.

Textured ceilings and asbestos

Textured coatings were popular in the village’s bungalows and inter-war houses. Any coating that may date from before 2000 could contain asbestos, so we ask owners to get a sample tested before any scraping or sanding. With a clear result, we can skim over the texture after preparing it. If it is not, overboarding seals the old coating in place without disturbing it, or a licensed specialist can remove it first.

Damp near the canal and the brook

Houses close to the canal, or on lower ground near the small streams that drain the area, can suffer from damp at low level, and sometimes from condensation in older, colder rooms. Before re-plastering, we ask what the cause is. If it is a leaking gutter, a high flower bed or a bridged damp-proof course, it should be fixed first. Once it is, we use a plaster that suits the wall: lime on solid brick and old timber frame, and suitable backing plasters where a damp specialist has specified them.

Cracks at old-to-new junctions

With so many extended homes in the village, we often see straight cracks where an extension meets the original house, or where a dormer was added to a bungalow. Some movement is normal as new work dries and settles. If cracks keep reopening, we cut them out, reinforce them with scrim or mesh and refill them before skimming, rather than filling them with flexible decorator’s filler that will crack again.

Blown and drummy plaster

Tapping a wall and hearing a hollow sound tells you the plaster has parted from the brick behind it. In houses that have been altered many times, this is common around old fireplaces and where pipes or cables have been chased in. A small hollow patch can be cut back and filled. Where most of a wall sounds hollow, it is better hacked off and re-plastered, so the whole wall is sound.

Room by room in a typical extended bungalow

Living room

The living room often has the most textured ceiling in the house, and frequently has a chimney breast that has been taken out or partly removed. We test the ceiling, then skim or overboard it, and make good the wall and ceiling where the chimney once stood.

Kitchen and dining

Where the kitchen has been opened up into a rear extension, the ceiling usually consists of old plaster, new plasterboard and a beam. We tape the joints, bead the beam and skim the whole area so it reads as one room. Behind the units, we only need a sound base for tiles or splashbacks, so we focus the finish where it will be seen.

Bedrooms

In bedrooms under the original roof, ceilings often show cracks along the joists. In new dormer bedrooms, there are sloping ceilings and knee walls to board. We pay attention to the junctions between the slope and the flat, because that is where cracks most often show.

Bathroom

Bathrooms need moisture-resistant board on wet walls, and a good extractor fan to keep condensation off the ceiling. Where tiles are going on, we leave a surface suited to tiling. Where the walls will be painted, we skim to a smooth finish.

Hall and landing

Halls and landings take the most knocks. Corner beads, solid backing and a good hard skim help them last. Where a new staircase has gone in, there is usually a strip of making good to do along the string and the landing.

Planning, the parish and the green belt

Who looks after what

Hockley Heath is covered by Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council for planning and building control. Since 2009 it has had its own parish council, covering the village and Nuthurst, after the old, much larger parish was split into four. Some parts of the village sit right on the border with Warwickshire and the Stratford-on-Avon district, so it is worth confirming which council covers your address.

Green belt and listed buildings

Almost all the land around the village is green belt, which limits new building and large extensions. Inside the house, plastering does not normally need planning permission. Listed buildings are different: changes to historic plaster, render or internal layouts can need listed building consent. If you live in one of the listed farmhouses or barns around the village, check with the council before work starts, and keep records of what was there before.

Building regulations

Most plastering on its own does not need building regulations approval, but the projects it is part of often do: extensions, loft conversions, garage conversions and some window and wall changes. Your builder or architect should have that covered. We work to the approved plans and can leave space for building control to inspect insulation and fire boards before they are skimmed.

Lime, gypsum and the right material for the wall

When gypsum is the right choice

For most houses built from the 1930s onwards, modern gypsum plaster and plasterboard are the right materials. They are quick to apply, dry fast, give a hard, smooth finish and suit cavity walls and timber studwork. Most of the village’s bungalows, extensions and later houses fall into this group.

When lime is the better choice

For the older farmhouses, the Victorian houses with solid brick walls and anything timber-framed, lime is usually better. It allows damp to pass through and evaporate rather than being trapped, it is slightly flexible so it copes with movement in old structures, and it matches what was originally there. It takes longer to apply and dry, and it needs more care, but it protects the building.

Mixing the two

Many houses in Hockley Heath have both. An Edwardian house might have lime on the original walls and gypsum in the extension. That is fine as long as each material is on the right wall. The problems start when gypsum or cement is patched onto old lime walls, or when a damp wall is sealed with a modern plaster and paint that stops it drying. When we quote, we tell you what we think is on the wall now and what should go back on it.

Materials we use

Plasterboard

Ordinary plasterboard in most rooms, moisture-resistant board in bathrooms and kitchens, fire board where regulations need it, sound-resistant board for party walls and bedrooms, and insulated board for cold external-facing rooms where it suits the wall.

Plaster

Multi-finish skim for most interior work, bonding and browning coats for backing, hardwall where a tougher base is needed, and lime plasters for older houses. On damp-affected walls, we use whatever the damp specialist has specified, or advise on a breathable alternative.

Beads, scrim and mesh

Angle beads for corners, stop beads for edges and junctions, scrim tape for board joints and mesh for reinforcing cracks and junctions between old and new. These hidden details are what keep a finish crack-free over time.

What we need from you before a quote

The quickest way to get a quote is to send photos. Useful things to include:

• A wide photo of each room or wall, plus close-ups of any cracks, stains or damage.
• Rough room sizes, or the length and height of the walls involved.
• The age of the house, if you know it, and whether it is listed.
• What else is happening: new kitchen, rewiring, extension, sale.
• Your preferred timing, and whether the rooms will be empty.

Once we have that, we can usually give a guide quote, or arrange to see the job if it needs a closer look.

A Hockley Heath job, step by step

Before we arrive

We agree dates, confirm what is included and talk through access and parking. Where there is a driveway this is straightforward, but on the main road we may need to plan for traffic and deliveries.

Protecting the house

We cover floors, stairs and furniture with dust sheets and protective film, tape around doorways and keep the work area separate from the rooms you are living in. We take extra care in occupied homes, especially where children or pets are around.

Preparation

Old wallpaper, loose paint and failed plaster are removed. Cracks are cut out and reinforced. Sound surfaces are cleaned and primed with a bonding agent where needed. On ceilings that are being overboarded, we fix new boards into the joists through the old ceiling.

Plastering

Backing coats go on first where they are needed, then the finish coat, which is trowelled up to a smooth, flat surface. On lime work, coats are built up more slowly, with time between them to firm up.

Clearing up

Every evening the work area is swept and tidied. At the end of the job we take away waste, remove protection and leave the room ready for drying and decorating.

Drying and decorating

A gypsum skim is normally ready for paint after somewhere between a few days and a week, depending on the time of year and how warm and ventilated the room is. Wait until the colour has gone a uniform light pink, with no darker damp patches left. The first coat should be a mist coat of watered-down emulsion so it soaks in and grips. Lime plaster takes much longer and should be painted with a breathable paint. Our guide to plaster drying times explains the stages in more detail.

A little hairline cracking at board joints and in corners is normal as a new room dries, especially in extensions. A good decorator will deal with it. If more than that appears, let us know and we will come back and look.

Working hours and timing

We work Monday to Friday from 7am to 5pm and on Saturdays from 7am to 1pm. We do not work on Sundays. A single room skim usually takes a day, and a whole floor or an extension can take several days, depending on drying times between coats. On larger jobs we work through the rooms in an order that keeps the house usable.

Five things to ask before you choose a plasterer

• Will you check the ceiling from the loft before deciding how to repair it?
• What do you think is on my walls now, and what should go back on?
• What protection goes down before work starts?
• How long should I wait before painting, and what should I use first?
• What happens if cracks appear after the work is done?

A good plasterer should be able to answer all of these clearly.

Points where the records differ

The history of the village has been written up in several places, and the details do not always match. We have kept these out of the main text as facts, but they are worth knowing if you are researching your house:

• The canal is variously described as reaching Hockley Heath in 1798, or as being dug through the village that year. Either way, the wharf was operating by around the turn of the century.
• The story of Princess Victoria staying at Hockley House in 1837 comes from local accounts. We have not found it in a primary record.
• Umberslade Hall is dated to 1680 in some accounts and to around 1695 in others.
• The link between Hocca’s hill and other Hockleys in Warwickshire is a suggestion, not a proven connection.

Nearby areas we cover

Hockley Heath sits between Cheswick Green, Dickens Heath, Lapworth and Tanworth-in-Arden, and our work covers each of those villages. Up the Stratford Road towards Birmingham, see our page for a plasterer in Shirley. Our local pages include plastering in Dickens Heath, Cheswick Green plastering, plastering in Lapworth, plastering in Tanworth-in-Arden, plastering in Bentley Heath, plastering in Henley-in-Arden and plastering in Solihull. The full range of work is on the plastering and rendering services page, and you can see all the areas we cover.

Hockley Heath and B94: one postcode, three councils

Hockley Heath is B94 6. It has its own parish council and sits in Solihull’s Dorridge and Hockley Heath ward. B94 doesn’t stop at the Solihull boundary, though. Parts of B94 6 around Tanworth-in-Arden are in Stratford-on-Avon district, and Lapworth, which is B94 5, comes under Warwick district. So a B94 address can belong to any of three councils, and we check which one before advising on planning for outside work.

Render repairs along the Stratford Road

Houses facing open fields along the A3400 take the weather hard. The render repairs we get asked about most:

• Spar dash and pebbledash that has lost its grip and sounds hollow.
• Painted render with flaking paint and cracks round the window heads.
• Older cottage walls where cement patches have trapped damp.

On the older solid walls, a breathable lime repair is usually right. On cavity-wall houses, a full re-render in K-Rend monocouche or silicone gives a finish that needs no painting.

Inside

Typical jobs include skimming, ceiling repairs, and plastering extensions and garden rooms.

Davey sees every job himself and does the work on site with the lads. See our main pages for a plasterer in Solihull and for rendering in Solihull. For a B94 quote, WhatsApp 07453 614095 or call 07453 614095.

Hockley Heath homes we plaster

Hockley Heath is a village on the Stratford Road with interwar homes, older cottages and countryside hamlets around it. Here’s where we work most, the homes you’ll find there and the plastering jobs that come up.

• Hockley Heath village. Interwar and post-war homes on the Stratford Road. Artex ceilings covered and through lounges.
• Nuthurst. Older houses. Lime repairs and ceilings.
• Lapworth. Village cottages. Careful repairs to old plaster.
• Cheswick Green. Village homes. Kitchen extensions and garage conversions.
• Tanworth-in-Arden. Cottages and farmhouses. Lime plaster and lath ceilings.
• Packwood. Country houses. Extensions and loft rooms.
• Earlswood. Village homes. Rooms replastered after a rewire.

Whatever the house, RCR Connections Ltd puts 62 years of combined experience into it. We’re Birmingham based, covering the whole of the Midlands, and we work Monday to Friday 7am to 5pm and Saturday 7am to 1pm. WhatsApp me on 07453 614095 or message the page with photos of the room and your road or postcode in Hockley Heath.

Outside, we also fit K-Rend monocouche and silicone render for homes around Hockley Heath, see rendering in Solihull. Down the lanes, we’re also the plasterer in Lapworth.

More services: Plastering repairs · Plastering and coving · Plastering extensions and lofts.

Contact RCR Connections Ltd

Our plasterers have 62 years of combined experience between them, from lath and plaster ceilings in old farmhouses to large new extensions. For a free, no-obligation quote, WhatsApp me on 07453 614095 or message the page. A few photos, the road you live on and a rough idea of the age of the house are enough for us to reply with a guide quote or a time to visit.

More from RCR Connections Ltd: Plasterer in Solihull · All plastering and rendering services · Areas we cover