Stone and oak porch - finished!

[Chappy]

Just finished this porch - the cottage is probably 300 years old, so the customer wanted something in keeping.

Here is what I started with - a newly made beautiful bespoke oak front door made by a joiner friend of the client. (I most certainly didn't make it - its stunning!)......but BADLY let down by all that ugly plumbing...

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So we drew up a plan of what we wanted and got digging some footings....
Put in a foot depth of concrete - which is a foot more than the cottage has!

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Then built the inner skin first to act as a nice plumb profile to build the stone against. These are the high density conblocks, with plenty of stainless wall ties to keep it strong...

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Then 4 square meters of tumbled ironstone laid with a nice hydraulic lime/sharp sand mortar. Not a bad match for the existing cottage....

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The client bought a reproduction Georgian post box for her mail. The wall at this point is 400mm thick to accommodate the mail box.....

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Suitable copings were really hard to find, so in the end I got some York sandstone flags from a reclaim yard and cut and mitered them to fit the wall. They are laid with a 15mm fall to the outside so the rain doesn't drip into the porch too much (Porch will be open-sided)

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Then its back to the joiner (same guy who made the door), he built this beautiful framework out of green oak. The uprights are clear of the masonry by setting in some stainless M14 threaded bar with resin. The bottom of the uprights then sit on square stainless steel plates to stop water going up the endgrain. You can see the staining on my stonework from the tannin seeping out of the oak - I posted on here about how I was quite worried about it, but I found that it hadn't soaked into the stone and could be scraped off gently with a pointing trowel (see final pics).

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Then it was my turn to put the roof on. Oak laths (try getting those off the shelf!) and concrete tiles - I would have preferred old tiles or slates, but the client wanted it to match the re-roofed main house, so fair enough. Cement verges and a hundred quids worth of lead flashing ( ) and Bobs your uncle.
Heres a few more pics (wake up at the back! ) of the finished result with the plumbing all hidden at last!

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[wine~o]

Fantastic....


Once it's aged a little (Try yoghurt ) you'd never know it wasn't part of the original build.

[rough cut]

that looks great and well in keeping with the main house...... nice job

[steviejoiner74]

Really nice job,well done

[nick200]

That looks really great

[ayjay]

Fantastic....


Once it's aged a little (Try yoghurt ) you'd never know it wasn't part of the original build.

Cowsh is cheaper if you're in the country, works just as well.

I do like exposed rafter feet, done a couple of roofs with the same feature myself this year.

Any guttering going on?

[Gadget]

Post box looks great!..

[Bikergirl]

Love the post box, and the whole job looks fantastic!

[Chappy]

Thanks folks!
I am rather proud of my input into this job simply because I worked on the plan with Paul the joiner (who I hadn't met before) who has a real talent for conservation oak-work, and between us, with the customers wants in mind we came up with this.
As for guttering Ayjay, it was originally planned - we were going to have the old style brackets which attach to the rafter ends, and a reproduction cast iron or even copper gutter or similar. But as the porch took shape we agreed that it might look better without, and being as the roof is so short we might not need it. Also we would have to accommodate a downpipe somewhere which might spoil the simplicity.
So we are going to leave as is for now with guttering as an option - it hasn't rained properly yet to test it out.

[big-all]

yep stunning job all round
post box fantastic
only other though ----

---a tall person walking through the porch entry not noticing the timbers overhead
what is the porch clearance it looks around 6ft ??

[Chappy]

I can see what you mean BA, but whilst I don't know the height to the rafter ends, I can say that it hasn't been an issue or even mentioned, which tells me all is well. (We are all fairly tall). Its certainly 4" or so higher than the front door, and one hell of a lot higher than some of the doorways and beams inside the house!
But now you've mentioned it my OCD is kicking in and I'm going to have to go and measure it!

[DIY_Johnny]

Looks great guys.Interesting to see the different stages.

Just curious, what do those oak square columns sit on? Whats the reason they are not sitting directly on the wall slabs?

[big-all]

I can see what you mean BA, but whilst I don't know the height to the rafter ends, I can say that it hasn't been an issue or even mentioned, which tells me all is well. (We are all fairly tall). Its certainly 4" or so higher than the front door, and one hell of a lot higher than some of the doorways and beams inside the house!
But now you've mentioned it my OCD is kicking in and I'm going to have to go and measure it!

aaahhh see what it is
normally when you take a picture your veiw is from eye level about 6" lower than you height
so the porch should look higher than the door because its closer
but because your level is elevated by about a foot is looks a lot lower than it actually is

[cotswold builders]

Also we would have to accommodate a downpipe somewhere which might spoil the simplicity.

Chain down pipe would look good.

You could have saved on the oak battens, and plyed over the roof timbers prior to batten, you wouldn't see the underside of tiles then.

All in all a good job Chappy.

[Chappy]

The customer wanted to look up inside the porch to see all the oak, including laths - she even told me off for suggesting that ordinary pine laths would be a lot cheaper. At £36 for five short lengths of 2x1 I'd want to see them too!