Old masonry usually fails for one of three reasons. Water is getting in somewhere it should not. The ground under it has moved. Or somebody repaired it once already with the wrong material.
That last one is common and it does real damage. A hard modern mortar in a soft old wall will not give, so the movement goes into the brick face instead of the joint, and the brick spalls. The repair outlives the wall it was meant to save.
We match mortar to what is already there, rake joints to proper depth rather than skimming the surface, and rebuild failed sections with the original units where they can be salvaged. Then we find where the water was coming in, because otherwise it comes back.
How it goes in
- 01
Find the cause
Water, movement or a previous repair. Fixing the symptom alone buys a couple of years.
- 02
Match the mortar
Colour, texture and hardness matched to the original, softer than the units around it.
- 03
Rake and repoint
Joints cut back to sound mortar and refilled, not skimmed over the failure.
- 04
Rebuild what is gone
Failed sections taken down and rebuilt, original units salvaged where they are sound.