Old streets in a historic town
Newark-on-Trent grew around its castle and St Mary Magdalene, the tallest church in Nottinghamshire, and its conservation area, first designated in 1968, was only the second ever designated in England. The town grew again in the Victorian era with ironworks, engineering, brewing and sugar refining, and housing from that time has caught the council's eye too. In 2022, a review proposed adding the late-Victorian and Edwardian planned housing around the Magnus School on Hatton Gardens, Winchilsea Avenue and Milner Street, the 19th-century houses on Crown Street, and the late-Victorian and early 20th-century houses on Lime Grove.
Patching late-Victorian houses
In homes like these, the walls are usually solid brick with lime-based plaster, and ceilings are lath and plaster. Common patch jobs include:
- areas of plaster that have come loose behind wallpaper, found when the paper comes off
- cracked plaster where the ceiling meets the wall in bedrooms
- holes left by old gas pipes, bell wires or picture rails taken down
- a ceiling section that has stained and softened under a bathroom
Stripping wallpaper in an older house often reveals more than you expected, because the paper has been holding loose plaster in place. It is worth stripping a room fully before booking repairs, so you can see the real extent of the damage and get it all dealt with together. Resist the urge to pick at loose areas; leave them for the plasterer to take back to sound edges.
Once the loose plaster is out, the exposed brick is prepared and the hollows are built back up in coats. On a wall with a lot of damage, patching every area and then skimming the whole wall usually gives a more even result than a string of separate patches.
New estates at Fernwood and Middlebeck
Newark's newer housing is a different job. Fernwood is a new estate, the Middlebeck development is on the southern edge of town, and homes have been built on the former Balderton Hospital site. Balderton itself forms one built-up area with the town, so it is covered in just the same way. These houses are lined with plasterboard. Patch repairs mean dealing with holes from brackets, damaged corners, splits along board joints, and cut-outs where pipes or cables were moved. Board is replaced where needed and finished with a thin coat of plaster over the repair.
Planning a visit from Mapperley
At about 15 miles, Newark-on-Trent is towards the far end of our area, so it helps to gather every repair onto one list, with a photo and rough size for each. Send it through the enquiry form or call 07877 353120. Patch Me If You Can works seven days a week, 7am to 5pm.
