FORMER FARMHOUSE, CHARLESTOWN, CORNWALL.

The property illustrated is in the attractive port of Charlestown near St. Austell, this former farmhouse has evolved over many generations, to a now substantial property of which the village should be proud, and now in the hands of sympathetic, private ownership.

Below: A before shot of the rear of the property prior to any works carried out by Darrock & Brown to tidy up the elevation as an individual element of a larger refurbishment programme being carried out by another contractor.

The building itself comprises a real mixture of construction methods and techniques, ranging from rubble masonry, face brickwork (something of a novelty in the Cornish tradition), Cob and concrete blockwork infill.

Below: A shot of the rear of the property after restoration work.

No major problems were being experienced with this particular wall, but plenty of minor ones, with a higher than comfortable moisture content present. This particular wall had been decorated with a contemporary masonry paint applied over a cement wash, the passage of time had left this wall in a poor state of repair but still relatively sound and liberated of too much cement, in the form of a render or repair mortars. A lot of the original materials were easy enough to recognise underneath the surviving treatments.

The walls were carefully cleaned down removing all traces of the cement wash, using simple methods and hand tools, with all traces of cement mortars removed. The surface was then prepared for a bag rub (tight render finish) using appropriate sands to achieve a self-colour. This technique demands a very good sand (in the context of hydraulic lime) and the one used here is a coarse yellow sand we import from the Shires, Cornish Lime ref: CLS49. We would however recommend caution with this approach, using a natural sand for a self coloured render can sometimes leave colour differences as a function of the way it is mixed, applied or other such influences and we would suggest an open approach where lime washing may be required in the event of an unsatisfactory outcome.

Other masonry works were carried out on this site by Darrock & Brown to tidy up the damage inflicted by the use of cement with very rewarding results for both the client and the company.

Below is the result of some of this work.