Specification by Period

Specification Notes

Foundations - Concrete strip foundations typically 600mm wide and 150-200mm thick. Text books of the time suggested foundations should always be at least 3 feet deep (900mm). Piled foundations were not unknown under flats but very rare outside main cities.  Development land was relatively cheap - poor sites could be avoided.

Walls - Most houses built in 250mm cavity construction with brickwork in both leaves; wall ties mostly galvanised steel or steel coated with bitumen. Even as late as 1930s some houses were still built with solid walls (one-brick thick). Mortar was usually lime based, sometimes gauged with cement. DPCs  could be lead-cored bitumen coated, slate, asphalt, and, for horizontal DPCs only, waterproof cements and natural pitch (from coal). Rendering was popular throughout UK and often hid walls built in clinker or breeze blocks rather then brick. Most plasters lime based, usually with cheap bulk fillers such as ash in base coats. Special hard plasters such as Keene's used for external angles and decorative work.  Some houses were plastered with 'new' fast setting plasters such as Selenetic lime. Gypsum plasters used mostly for 'running' cornices and mouldings. Lime plaster was sometimes gauged with gypsum to speed up the set.

Windows - Sash windows largely disappear in early 1920s. Timber single-rebated hinged casements very common, sometimes with leaded glass and stained glass in top lights. Some windows steel. Concrete and steel lintels support loads over openings. Segmental arches and timber lintels still common.

Roofing - Traditional 'cut' purlin roofs – often with hipped ends. Larger properties with strutted purlins. Double-lap slate or clay plain tiles, or single-lap clay tiles depending on geographical location. Many houses had clay interlocking tiles imported from Northern Europe. Some houses had roofing felt (sarking felt) or torching but no roof insulation and no ventilation. A few roofs were boarded on top of the rafters - this was quite common with slated roofs - the slate was then fixed directly to the boards, usually with a sarking felt in between. Guttering and downpipes usually cast iron. A few 'Modernist' houses had flat roofs - usually t & g boarding with natural rock asphalt or sheet asphalt (felt impregnated with tar, pitch or bitumen)

Ground Floor - Raised timber floor with square edged or t&g boards and terracotta vents. Joists supported on sleeper walls built on concrete oversite. A few houses can be found with concrete ground floors with a sandwich bitumen membrane. Industrial waste often used as hardcore.

Upper Floor - Softwood joists with square edged or t&g boarding. Joists built-in, supported on corbels or joist hangers (mild steel).  Floors strutted with herringbone struts, folding wedges either end. Ceilings timber lath and 3 coats lime plaster; a few houses had plasterboard or similar ceilings. Traditional trimming using tusk tenons and housed joints around stair openings and fireplaces.

Internal walls - Half brick or stud partitions covered with lime or sanded gypsum plaster. Softwood panel doors.

Services - Coal fires throughout. A back boiler often fed a direct cylinder for water heating. Other houses had gas geysers. Central heating with steel or cast iron radiators available but very rare in modest houses. Electricity – a few houses still being built with lighting circuits only in the early 1930s. Original cables rubber insulated, India rubber coated and braided. More expensive cable was lead sheathed. Switches were Bakelite or polished brass on wooden blocks. Lead-piped or copper cold water supply to kitchen. Distribution pipework lead or copper. Upstairs WCs with high level cisterns. Nearly all new houses built with upstairs bathrooms. Galvanised cold water tank, copper or galvanised steel hot water cylinder. Combined mains drainage, rigid-jointed salt glazed clay pipes, interceptor traps in  garden.  Two-pipe cast iron system of above ground drainage. Cast iron gutters and downpipes.