Plasterer in Cheam

Plastering in Cheam's inter-war housing

Much of Cheam is made up of substantial 1930s detached and semi-detached houses, with mock-Tudor frontages around the village and pockets of older cottages. Rooms are usually generous, which is precisely why the finish matters: a long, well-lit wall in a Cheam reception room shows every ripple that a smaller room would hide.

Ceilings in these properties are typically original lath and plaster or early plasterboard carrying several decades of paint. Where a ceiling still has good adhesion, overboarding and skimming gives a clean flat result without the upheaval of pulling it down. Where it is already flexing between joists, taking it down is the honest answer, and we will say so.

Making good after alterations

A large share of our Cheam work follows structural change — chimney breasts removed, reception rooms knocked through, new windows fitted into deep bay reveals, or a rear extension tied into the original house. All of these leave junctions where old and new surfaces meet at slightly different levels.

Getting that junction invisible is a plastering job rather than a decorating job. We build the surface out where it needs it and skim across the whole area so the eye reads one flat plane instead of a repair.

The parts of Cheam we work in most

Around Cheam Village the housing is older and more varied — cottages off the Broadway, larger detached houses on the roads towards Nonsuch Park, and a number of properties where earlier alterations have left mixed wall build-ups behind the paint. Plastering in Cheam Village usually starts with checking what is actually there before pricing, because a solid wall, a dabbed board and a lath partition all behave differently under a skim.

North Cheam and the roads towards Worcester Park are more consistently inter-war and post-war, with plasterboard ceilings and sand and cement backing coats on the external walls. Work here tends to be room re-plastering ahead of decorating, ceiling repairs after a leak, and boarding out where a wall has been opened up.

We also cover the SM3 roads towards Stonecot Hill and Cheam Common, and the SM2 side towards Belmont and Sutton. If you are looking for plasterers in Cheam and are not sure whether your road is inside our area, it almost certainly is — call and we will confirm in a minute.

How a Cheam plastering job actually runs

Most jobs begin with a short visit. Photographs by WhatsApp are enough for a rough figure on a straightforward ceiling or a single room, but for anything involving alterations, damp history or several rooms we would rather see it. There is no charge for the visit and no obligation.

On the day, floors and any furniture that stays are sheeted, doorways are protected and dust is kept to the room being worked in. A typical Cheam bedroom ceiling and walls is a one to two day job; a through-lounge after a chimney breast removal is usually two to three. Fresh plaster needs to dry before decorating — commonly four to seven days on a skim coat, longer on new backing plaster or in colder months.

You deal with the same plasterer from quotation to completion, and the room is left swept and tidy rather than handed back for you to clear up.