Repointing in Littleborough

Littleborough and the villages up towards Blackstone Edge and Hollingworth Lake are stone — gritstone terraces, weavers' cottages and canal-side buildings that were built with lime and need repointing in lime. Cement on these walls is what causes the damp and the spalling; we take it out and put the right mortar back.

Exposure up here is severe. We schedule stone work for the right weather and protect it while it cures.

Littleborough stone is coarse gritstone, and the original lime joints were struck slightly recessed so the water runs off the stone rather than sitting on the mortar. A lot of it was repointed in cement in the 70s and 80s, flush and proud, which is why so many walls here show spalled faces and green staining below the joints. We rake the cement back to sound mortar, sometimes 50mm or more, and repoint in a natural hydraulic lime matched to the sandy-buff colour of the original.

Hollingworth Lake, Smithy Bridge, Calderbrook and the Summit side of the valley are our regular streets. The canal-side terraces and the weavers' cottages with their long mullioned windows need particular care around the stone heads and cills, which we re-bed and point at the same time. Chimneys up here catch the prevailing weather off Blackstone Edge and are usually the first thing to fail — ring us before the stack starts shedding mortar onto the slates.