DH Painter & Decorator paints house exteriors in Brixworth, the NN6 village on the A508 north of Northampton. In the historic core that mostly means timber windows and doors on unpainted stone; on the post-1960s estates it is a full repaint of joinery, render and rooflines. Dean visits first and gives a free quote.
Two different villages for outside work
For exterior painting, Brixworth splits roughly in two. The historic core around All Saints’ Church, Church Street, Silver Street, High Street, Newlands and Harborough Road is built of squared lias, limestone rubble and warm ironstone, under thatch, slate or tile. There the stone stays bare, and the painting is almost all joinery: white timber casements, sashes, ledged plank doors and the odd porch. South and east of the old village, the estates built from the 1960s onwards are red or buff brick, some with render panels, and an exterior job there looks like a typical house repaint covering frames, doors, fascias, walls and garden timber.
We cover Brixworth from our Northampton base, which is about 6.5 miles to the south along the A508. A walk round the house before quoting tells us which kind of job it is, and on some plots it is a bit of both.
The 2019 Article 4 direction and your front elevation
Brixworth Village Conservation Area was designated in 1979 and reappraised in 2017, when Brixworth Hall Park and Froghall were brought in. Since the council made an Article 4(1) direction in October 2019, owners of the named addresses have needed planning permission to paint a front wall, or any wall facing a road, waterway or open space. Those addresses include parts of Spratton Road, Holcot Road, Northampton Road, Harborough Road, High Street, Silver Street, Church Street, Cross Hill, Station Road, Froghall, Newlands and Kennel Terrace.
So before we quote for a change of exterior colour, we check the address against that list. If the house is covered, the planning application comes first and the colour decision waits for the answer. The 2017 appraisal also steers repainted windows towards white or a shade drawn from the original paint, which is why most cottage casements in the core go back in white.
Casements, sashes and plank doors with a long paint history
The 18th and 19th-century houses on Newlands, Church Street and High Street have timber casements painted white and timber sashes, while the vernacular cottages often keep plank doors. All of them carry decades of coatings, so we treat old layers as possibly lead-based and scrape or wet-abrade rather than dry-sand. Sashes are eased and the paint kept off the beads so they still run. Plank doors move with the seasons, so they need a flexible joinery coating, oil-based or microporous, that will not crack along each joint.
Stone mullions and lintels sit hard against many frames, as on the listed George Inn on Northampton Road. We cut in by hand with the stone protected, because paint that strays onto lias or ironstone is difficult to take off without scarring the face.
Protected trees and lanes that run to the wall
There are about 59 tree preservation orders and 9 TPO groups in or near the conservation area, plus the tree belts around Brixworth Hall Park. Elevations under those trees dry slowly, pick up sap and leaf litter, and cannot be opened up by cutting branches back. We wash down, wait for the timber to dry right through, and plan top coats for the warmer middle of the day. Our guide to timing exterior painting in the UK covers the seasons.
Church Street, Silver Street and Newlands are narrow, often with no pavement, and many houses stand right on the road edge behind high stone walls. Ladders there stand on the highway, so we keep the footprint tight, have someone at the foot and avoid the busiest times. On the wide Northampton, Spratton and Holcot Roads the issue is passing traffic rather than width.
Estate houses south and east of the village
The housing built on fields south of the old village from the 1960s, and later schemes such as Hall Farm Close that mix stone with brick detailing, is not on the streets named in the Article 4 direction. Here a repaint usually takes in window frames and sills, the front door, fascias and soffits, any rendered panels and long fence runs, done in one visit. Our main exterior painting service page sets out how each surface is prepared, and the Brixworth area page covers indoor work in the village too.
Last updated by Dean, DH Painter & Decorator.
