DH Painter & Decorator offers commercial painting in Dallington, NN5, about 1.3 miles north-west of Northampton town centre. Dallington has no shopping parade, so the work is on a handful of premises: the listed Wheatsheaf pub, the listed Spencer Club and a GP surgery, plus future shops at Dallington Grange.
A suburb with very few business premises
Dallington is mostly homes. No shopping parade turns up in the sources we checked; the business premises that do are The Wheatsheaf at 126 Dallington Road, the Spencer Club, and Harlestone Road Surgery at 117 Harlestone Road. Two of those are listed buildings in the Dallington Conservation Area. That makes commercial painting here less about large office floors and more about working on old, protected buildings that have to stay open while the work is done.
How we plan commercial work in general, from risk assessments to out-of-the-way storage, is on our main commercial painting page.
The Wheatsheaf: thatch, sandstone and drinkers
The Wheatsheaf, opposite the Church of St Mary, is an 18th-century Grade II listed inn of sandstone ashlar under a thatched roof, with leaded metal casements and a sash. Any painting there comes with a set of fixed rules:
- No heat stripping. With thatch overhead, old paint is removed chemically or by hand only.
- The sandstone itself stays unpainted. Plastic masonry paint on historic stone traps moisture and damages the face; only the joinery and metalwork are painted.
- External colours and finishes are kept like for like unless listed building consent has been granted for a change.
- Leaded casements are prepared by hand around the cames, with metal primer on any bare iron.
Inside, a two-room pub cannot be shut for a week for redecoration. A sensible plan does one room at a time, at times agreed with the licensee, using low-odour waterborne paints so the other room can keep trading.
The Spencer Club and other listed rooms
The Spencer Club is housed in a 17th-century Grade II listed building. Decorating is scheduled with whoever runs the building, with furniture moved and covered in sections rather than all at once. On old walls and joinery the priority is matching what is there and keeping the fabric breathable, not modernising it. If a committee wants a colour change on the outside, it should check with the council’s conservation officer before booking.
A surgery on Harlestone Road
A GP surgery is a working clinic with patients, staff and confidential records, so painting has to avoid both disruption and smell. For premises like Harlestone Road Surgery we would expect to work room by room, at times agreed with the practice, and use low-VOC, scrubbable paints in waiting areas and corridors where walls are wiped down often. Consulting rooms are cleared, covered and handed back the same day where possible, and wet-paint signage keeps patients away from fresh surfaces.
Future shops at Dallington Grange
Later phases of the Dallington Grange development are planned to include shops. New commercial units usually hand over with bare or barely sealed plaster and primed steelwork, so a fit-out repaint is often the first job a new tenant needs. When those units open, frontage work will be covered on our shopfront painting page. Units in a new development also tend to come with landlord rules on approved colours and signage, so the lease is the first thing to check before choosing a scheme.
The brook valley setting of the old village means damp mornings, so exterior commercial work there is booked for settled weather and started once surfaces are dry. For more on the area, see our Dallington page.
Last updated by Dean, DH Painter & Decorator.
