Dean takes on commercial painting in Overstone Leys, the growing urban extension on Northampton's north-eastern fringe, 4.6 miles from the centre. Business premises here are few and new, and several are occupied care or education buildings where low-odour paints and phased work matter more than speed.
A neighbourhood with no high street yet
Overstone Leys is unusual for a place of more than 2,000 planned homes in that its commercial life is still mostly on paper. Planning consent covers shops, a pub, a care home, a nursery and employment floor space, all due to arrive phase by phase. For now the non-domestic buildings are a short list:
- Aldi, at the Moulton Roundabout end;
- Overstone House, a care facility on Ouiston Way;
- the new primary school by the A43, designed for 420 pupils.
Beyond the estate, Round Spinney Industrial Estate lies across the Moulton Bypass, and Moulton village’s shops on Overstone Road are on the other side of the A43.
Occupied buildings that cannot simply close
Most of the premises here are in use every day by people who are vulnerable or very young. That changes how a repaint is run.
Care settings such as Overstone House, and the care home and nursery in the plans, need paints with very low odour and low VOC content, worked a section at a time so the people using the building can be kept clear of the area being painted. Finishes on corridor walls and door frames need to stand up to repeated cleaning and to trolley and wheelchair contact, so we use scrubbable and durable products.
Schools are normally painted during holidays, or on weekends for small areas. The plans for Overstone Leys Primary School, submitted by the council in December 2023, include a green roof, solar panels and EV chargers, so it is a modern building where the work would mostly be classroom, hall and corridor repaints rather than older fabric.
Our main commercial painting page covers method statements, RAMS and how we plan around business hours.
The listed gate next to the school
Beside the school site stands Pytchley Gate, a Grade II structure put up in the late 16th century. It is not an ordinary repaint. Any work on or immediately around it would need listed building consent and materials suited to historic fabric. If a contract near the school involves the gate, that needs agreeing with the council before anyone quotes for decoration.
New local-centre units as they open
As the local centre, pub and employment space are built, new units will need fit-out decoration: mist-coating fresh plaster, painting new partitions and finishing doors and frames before trading starts. Fit-out work usually runs to a fixed opening date, with other trades working alongside. With construction still going on around the estate, external work is timed for quiet spells on neighbouring parcels and surfaces are cleaned first, because site dust settles readily on wet paint.
Access and arranging a survey
Every delivery comes in off the A43, and parts of the estate share roads with construction traffic, so delivery and parking times are agreed with the site manager in advance. We are fully insured for commercial work. Before quoting we visit to see the building, agree working hours and any areas that must stay open, and confirm the products, including any the client already specifies for maintenance. Background on the neighbourhood is on the Overstone Leys hub, and frontage work for new units has its own Overstone Leys shopfront page.
Last updated by Dean, DH Painter & Decorator.
