Exterior cleaning across Bath, done the way Bath stone needs it

Last updated: 2026-05-21 · Founder-led · £5m insured · 7-day rework

Bath is unlike anywhere else we work. Roughly five thousand listed buildings, a near-total conservation overlay, and a building stock faced almost entirely in soft oolitic limestone that does not behave like brick or modern render. We work to a method statement, every job. Doff steam where the stone is at risk. Near-neutral soft wash where it is not. Or we walk away from the work.

Do you cover Bath?

Yes. BA1, BA2 and the close-in parts of BA3 are core territory. Our vans run the A4 between Bristol and Bath every working day, so a Bath survey usually lands within five working days, often sooner. We work conservation-aware as standard, soft wash on stone, doff steam where the substrate is too soft to take pressure at all, and a free written method statement you can share with your conservation officer or insurer.

Bath stone: what every owner should know before anyone touches your facade

If you own a Georgian, Regency, Victorian or even early-twentieth-century property anywhere inside the BA1 or BA2 footprint, the principal elevations are very likely faced in Bath stone. Oolitic limestone quarried from the hills around Combe Down, Monkton Combe, Limpley Stoke and the wider Cotswold seam. It is a beautiful material. It is also a fragile one, and it does not behave like brick, render or modern engineered cladding.

Three properties matter for cleaning. Bath stone is porous. The pore network runs deep, so anything you put on the surface (water, detergent, biocide, mineral salts dissolved in rain) moves into the stone, not just across it. Bath stone is acid-soluble. Acidic washes including some brick-acid or hydrofluoric mixes still used by general pressure-washing operators literally dissolve it. The damage is not always immediate. It shows up as a softened, sugary, granular surface six to twenty-four months after the clean, by which point the operator is long gone. And the weathered surface is the protective skin. Over decades, exposed Bath stone develops a slightly hardened outer crust, a calcite-rich case that is genuinely protective of the softer stone behind it. High-pressure water and aggressive rotary tools strip that skin. Once it is gone, the freshly exposed inner stone weathers far faster than the original face ever did.

What we do instead. Soft wash or zero-pressure brush-and-rinse. Carefully selected near-neutral or mildly alkaline biocidal chemistry. Long dwell times. Low-volume rinsing. Nylon or natural-bristle brushwork on stubborn biological growth. On the most sensitive elevations, a doff steam unit at 140-150°C and 100-150 psi, which kills biology and lifts soiling without mechanical damage. The clean takes longer. It costs more per square metre. It does not strip the stone. (If you have been quoted £400 to "jet-wash the front of the house" on a BA1 Georgian terrace, please put the phone down and call us first.)

Postcode coverage: what changes from BA1 to BA3

The character of the housing stock varies sharply postcode to postcode, and our method varies with it.

BA1: central Bath, Lansdown, Larkhall, Camden

The Georgian and Regency core. Royal Crescent, the Circus, Brock Street, Gay Street, Queen Square, Lansdown Crescent, Camden Crescent, Somerset Place, the streets running up the hill towards Lansdown Road. Almost everything is Bath-stone-faced, much of it listed, much of it terraced. Walk between the Crescent buildings on a winter morning and you can feel why the wind funnels there. That same wind drives the algae load on the north-facing returns. Larkhall and parts of Camden bring in Victorian and Edwardian terraces, often with rendered or part-rendered facades and slate roofs.

BA2: Widcombe, Combe Down, Bear Flat, Bathwick, Oldfield Park

A genuinely mixed postcode. Bathwick gives you Sydney Place, Great Pulteney Street, Henrietta Street, full-Georgian terrace work, every bit as sensitive as central BA1. Widcombe blends Georgian villas with Victorian additions. Combe Down is the historic quarrying village itself, with stone cottages, stone-tile roofs and conservation status. Bear Flat and Oldfield Park bring late-Victorian and Edwardian terraces with bay fronts. Odd Down and the southern fringes pick up post-war and modern stock, including silicone-topcoat new-build render.

BA3: Radstock, Midsomer Norton, Peasedown St John, Paulton

Outer-village reach. The stone tradition continues. Much of the older stock is Mendip limestone or Bath stone, but the postcode also contains substantial twentieth-century housing, modern estates, and former coal-mining settlements with their own architectural mix. We service close-in BA3 routinely and quote it on the same basis as BA1 and BA2.

The conservation overlay

Most of central BA1 and a great deal of BA2 sits within the Bath conservation area. Several streets and quarters carry Article 4 directions that remove permitted-development rights for elevations and alterations. Cleaning, in itself, is generally permitted. It is the method that matters. Under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990, it is a criminal offence to carry out works that damage the special character of a listed building. We provide a free written method statement on request you can share with the council, your conservation officer or your insurer.

Services adapted for Bath

Every service we deliver is matched to the substrate in front of us. We do not run the Bristol playbook in BA1.

Render cleaning

We need to know what render we are dealing with before we touch it. New-build estates around Odd Down, Peasedown and the BA3 villages frequently use silicone or silicone-modified topcoats over insulated render systems. Older Bath stock uses traditional sand-and-cement or, on the most historic properties, lime render, vapour-permeable, soft, and not going to tolerate a high-pressure clean. We test, identify and soft-wash in every case.

Roof cleaning

Bath roofs are a serious matter. Many older properties carry stone slates from the Combe Down or Cotswold seams, often a century or more old, mortar-bedded at the ridges and verges. They are not concrete tiles. Walking on them carelessly cracks them. Jet-washing them strips the surface. We use roof ladders, harness work, soft chemistry and gentle mechanical removal. We say no to roofs we believe should be inspected by a heritage roofer first.

Gutter cleaning

Georgian and Regency Bath frequently uses lead-lined parapet gutters behind the front-elevation cornice, hidden gutters that drain through internal hoppers and stacks. They cannot be flushed with high pressure. Our gutter service on a Georgian terrace is a slow, hand-clear, vacuum-and-inspect job, photographed throughout.

Driveway and patio cleaning

Bath stone paving, Cotswold stone setts, York stone flagging and traditional pennant slabs are common across BA1 and BA2 private drives, courtyards and rear gardens. All limestone or sandstone family. All softer than the granite or porcelain you would treat aggressively in a modern Bristol new-build. We soft-wash, re-sand joints with kiln-dried sand where appropriate, and on lime-pointed setts we treat the joints with as much care as the stones.

Doff steam

Low-pressure superheated water at 140-150°C and 100-150 psi. The only safe method on the most sensitive Bath stone. We bring a doff unit out for stone on Royal Crescent fringe properties, the Circus and the Lansdown Crescent set. Slower, more expensive per square metre, the right method on the substrate.

Property types we work on most weeks in Bath

• Grade I Georgian terrace, ashlar Bath stone, lead-lined parapet gutters. Royal Crescent, the Circus, Lansdown Crescent, Somerset Place.
• Late Georgian Bathwick estate work along Great Pulteney Street, Sydney Place and Henrietta Street.
• Combe Down stone-tile cottages with mortar-bedded ridges and verges.
• Victorian and Edwardian Bear Flat and Oldfield Park bay-fronted terraces, slate and clay roofs.
• Silicone-topcoat new-builds around Odd Down, Peasedown St John and the BA3 estates.
• Listed cottages in Combe Down, Monkton Combe and the conservation lanes off the Limpley Stoke road.
• Cotswold-stone setts, York stone flagging and Bath stone paving on private drives across BA1 and BA2.
• Commercial frontages around SouthGate, Stall Street and Milsom Street where the conservation officer's eye is on every contractor van.

Three landmark-adjacent contexts

We are scrupulous about not fabricating a client list. We can describe the kinds of context in which we work.

Royal Crescent and the Circus area. Grade I terrace work demands the slowest, most careful soft-wash approach we deliver. The stone is original Bath stone. The visibility is total. The conservation expectations are absolute. Every clean here is a method-statement job.

Pulteney Bridge and Great Pulteney Street area. The Bathwick Estate's late-eighteenth-century terraces. Long, uniform Bath-stone facades. Complex shared frontages. Coordination between neighbouring owners is often the most useful service we provide here, because cleaning one house out of a terrace of seven looks worse than cleaning none of them.

Bath Abbey neighbourhood and the central conservation core. Abbey Green, Abbey Churchyard, North Parade, South Parade, Stall Street. Tight access. Pedestrianised zones. The Christmas Market crowd doubles the foot traffic for six weeks in November and December. We plan around it. In none of these contexts have we cleaned the named landmark itself. We have cleaned plenty of private residences and commercial premises within them, on a conservation-aware basis, without complaint.

Nearby areas we cover

Bath sits at the eastern end of the patch. The vans pass through Keynsham every working day on the way back to the depot.

• Bristol (BS1 to BS16)
• Clifton, Redland & Cotham
• Bedminster, Southville & Totterdown
• Bishopston, Horfield & Westbury-on-Trym
• Keynsham, Saltford & Hanham
• Filton, Patchway & Bradley Stoke
• Yate, Chipping Sodbury & Thornbury
• Portishead, Clevedon & Nailsea
• Weston-super-Mare

FAQs from Bath owners

Will jet washing damage Bath stone?

Yes, very often, and the damage is frequently irreversible. High-pressure water removes the weathered outer skin of the stone, the protective calcite-rich crust that has formed over decades, and exposes the softer stone behind, which then weathers far faster than the original surface. We do not jet-wash Bath stone. We soft-wash it, or doff-steam it if the stone is at higher risk.

Do I need Listed Building Consent to clean my facade?

Generally, no. Straightforward exterior cleaning of a listed building does not require LBC. But the method matters. If a contractor uses a method that damages the building, that is potentially an offence under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990. If your property is Grade I or II*, or you are unsure, contact Bath & North East Somerset Council's conservation team before work begins. We provide a written method statement, free of charge, that you can share with the council.

Can you do my Royal Crescent flat?

Yes. We work routinely on Grade I Georgian terrace stock across central Bath. Royal Crescent and equivalent properties get the slowest, most careful soft-wash approach we offer, with full method statement, runoff containment, and neighbour coordination where elevations are shared. We quote on a per-property basis after a site survey.

Can you do Combe Down stone-tile roofs?

Cautiously, yes. Stone-slate roofs of Combe Down or Cotswold origin are historic, often a century or more old, and require gentle treatment. Soft chemistry, careful mechanical moss removal, no high-pressure rinsing, and harness or roof-ladder access only. On any roof we believe is structurally questionable we recommend a heritage roofer's inspection before cleaning. We do not clean roofs we do not believe will tolerate cleaning.

How do I check if my building is listed?

The free Historic England National Heritage List for England (historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list) is the authoritative source. Search by postcode or address. Bath & North East Somerset Council's planning portal also shows conservation-area and Article 4 status for any address. If you would like us to check on your behalf as part of the survey, ask when you call.

Book a Bath survey

Free written survey with method statement, chemistry specification and a heritage-aware quote you can share with your conservation officer, architect or insurer.