What is Brick Cleaning & How Much it Costs?
Are you the owner of a building that has a beautiful brick façade? Or rather, a brick façade that was once beautiful but has now fallen prey to the vagaries of time, the climate, vandalism or graffiti? If that describes your building’s exterior, then brick cleaning is exactly what you need.
A brick is a wonderful material to build things from. It is cost-effective and hard-wearing, which make it quite popular among builders and homeowners alike. That said, a brick surface is also sought-after for the rustic and classic look it offers. However, owing to the brick’ porous nature, brickwork that is exposed to the elements develops certain blemishes after a few years or decades.
Many of these blemishes are of manmade origins. A quick walk down the older parts of London throws up countless buildings whose beautiful external brickwork is defaced with paint and graffiti.
These, and several other issues, can be corrected with a professional brick cleaning service. Here we look at what the service entails, how much it costs and why your building needs it.
What is brick cleaning?
To put it simply, brick cleaning is the process by which a brick masonry is cleaned. A brick masonry is where a layer of brick has been laid on the wall’s outermost surface.
Brick cleaning is required at different stages of a building’s life. For instance, the service is called upon when a building is being renovated or even constructed anew. In both cases, the finishes brickwork is often marred by cement smears and a clutch of other issues.
Older buildings that have been around for a long time can also benefit from good quality brick cleaning. Dirt and other kinds of damage are inescapable for any building, let alone one that stands in London. Besides being exposed to natural elements, London’s buildings are also exposed to dirt, grime, vandalism and pollutants. The perennially damp weather also does its bit to deface the exterior brickwork of a building; a good example is algae and moss growth.
Together, these factors turn your once clean and beautiful building into a dull and depressing one.
What does brick cleaning involve?
The surface of brick is porous and rough, which is ideal for dirt, grime and pollutant to accumulate in. This makes a high-pressure power wash the best way to dislodge such build-up from the brick surface. Among brick cleaning methods, high-pressure washing is also the most convenient as it helps cover a large area with very little human effort. When you compare this to cleaning the brickwork by hand, the idea of paying a professional brick cleaning service sounds a lot more appealing.
However, there could be cases where a pressure wash is not enough to remove deep-seated dirt and stains (like paint and graffiti) from the brickwork. In such cases, brick cleaning acid or sand-blasting can work. Both methods require a skilled pair of hands as they can cause bodily injury as well as irreparable damage to the brickwork.
If your building’s external brickwork has a few stains here and there, you can try removing them using a bucket of water and a scrubber, a garden hose or even some brick cleaning products. However, if the entire building needs to be cleaned, it is better to go with a professional masonry cleaning service.
What are the advantages of brick cleaning?
The obvious benefit of brick cleaning is that it restores the appearance of your brickwork back to how it was when newly installed. But what are its other benefits, you may ask.
- Better curb appeal – When you clean the entire brickwork, the result is a better curb appeal for your building. It’s not only the brickwork that looks better because of brick cleaning but so does your building. All said and done, being easy on the eyes is always a good thing.
- Increased value of building – Did you know that something as simple as cleaning the brick surface can increase the value of your building by two to five per cent? When you consider the actual cost of brick cleaning (more on that later), that is a steal of a deal.
- Removal of harmful bacteria – A prolonged build-up of bacteria, dirt, grime and mildew on the exterior brickwork of your building can prove harmful. Although the chances of them affecting your health directly are remote, they nevertheless do spoil the look of your building. Brick cleaning can remove all such stuff.
- Preventive maintenance – Regular cleaning is an excellent way to maintain the integrity of your building’s brickwork. For instance, if dirt, mildew and grime are allowed to have their way, they can cause the brickwork to chip or even crack. This is why many experts offer brick cleaning as a form of preventive maintenance instead of an outright cleaning exercise.
- Money-saving – Did you ever think spending money to get your building’s brickwork cleaned can save you more money? That is indeed the case as regular cleaning prolongs the life of your brickwork and prevents damage from the build-up of dirt, grime and mildew. The comparison of the cost of brick cleaning and that of getting your brickwork redone, as such, is a complete non-starter.
What is the cost of brick cleaning?
The brick cleaning cost in the UK, as with any other trade, varies from place to place and neighbourhood to neighbourhood. Brick cleaning services usually offer a quote on a per square metre basis. So, the service first sends personnel to evaluate your building and the total area of the brickwork that needs to be cleaned before offering you a quote.
However, this method doesn’t take into account the difficulty of removing certain types of stains from your brickwork. In such cases, the service provider may choose to offer a blanket quote that factors in the difficulty of removing stubborn stains.
That said, you can expect the per square metre rates to start at £50. Package rates for the entire building may start from as low as £500 depending upon the size of your building and the degree of its dirtiness. Goes without saying that the brick cleaning cost in London would be many times over that of the Midlands.
How to choose a good brick cleaning service provider?
Ah, this is a tricky one! Choosing a good provider is important for several reasons. For one, you don’t want an incompetent provider that degrades your brickwork instead of restoring it. Similarly, you don’t want a provider that charges the moon for what is essentially, a cleaning service. So how does one solve this conundrum?
Asking around might help. Talk to owners and managers of other buildings near you and ask for recommendations. Most people tend to stick with the same provider for years when it comes to services like these. This ensures you are not fleeced and get good quality service as well.
You can also search online for reliable brick cleaning services near you. Online reviews are also useful in separating the wheat from the chaff. A good brick cleaning company or provider will have several excellent reviews, which makes it easier for you to pick a reliable service provider.
Lastly, make sure you get quotes from at least three different brick cleaning service providers. This eliminates the possibility of someone overcharging you. That said, this forms the final step in your search for the best brick cleaning service provider.
If you’d like to know more about how your building’s brickwork can be cleaned and restored to its immaculate best, get in touch with us today. Basildon Stone is a leading provider of brick cleaning services in London. We have extensive experience in working on several buildings in the heart of London that date back to the mid-20th century. Hiring our services gets you a team of skilled and experienced masonry cleaners and state-of-the-art equipment; all that at a highly affordable price.
In addition to brick cleaning, we also offer services like stone cleaning, paint removal, graffiti removal and surface protection.
Get your free no obligation quote now:
Why Your Building’s Stone Exterior Needs Regular Cleaning & Maintenance
London’s landscape is home to numerous beautiful stone buildings. Stone after all is a proven material as far as the exteriors of any buildings are concerned. In fact, countless houses in the city and around the country use stone prominently in their facades. The novelty value of stone is without peer and if yours is a professional building, stone definitely helps you stand out from a crowd full of glass and steel structures.
But while it does offer a fantastic appearance, stone needs regular care to maintain that appearance. It’s susceptible to environmental factors (regardless of whether they are manmade or natural), which can cause stains, breakage, or even corrosion. If you are the owner of a stone-faced building, these are issues you must pre-empt and even if they do occur, stop them dead in their tracks.
What are the threats to exterior stone?
Stone is as vulnerable to the elements as other building materials like glass and metal. In fact, air pollution and rain (of the acid kind) are two foremost causes of damage to stone exteriors.
Both elements carry several minerals and micro-pollutants that harm stone. For instance, sulphates are chemicals that can erode stone surfaces and are passed to the stone by air as well as rain. If not checked in time, this can impact not only the stone’s appearance but also its function and sooner than later, leaves other parts of the building exposed to the elements.
The effect of salts, which are present in the rain or even within the stone, is along similar lines. They cause stains and other structural damage, especially when the stone is left untreated or wrongly installed. Water is able to penetrate the stone rather easily and over a period of time, ruins the stone’s appearance by bringing its minerals to the fore.
Stone’s problems do not stop at that. Even ice and snow are capable of degrading a stone façade irreparably. Improperly sealed or unmaintained stone can develop cracks, where water from the ice or snow enters and freezes. When this ice thaws, it dislocates the stone which further opens up the metal structure to the water’s corrosive action.
There are also several stone problems caused by human error. For instance, wrong installation that lets water in, low-grade caulking, and even graffiti are all capable of damaging stone. Issues related to drainage are also responsible for stone damage as it’s known to cause water leakages.
Preventing these threats to exterior stone
Cleaning stone buildings regularly is the only way to preserve their appearance and integrity. This not only prevents grime, dust and other elements from marring the stone’s appearance, but also averts future damage to the structure itself.
Regardless of whether your building’s exterior uses limestone or features granite veneers, regular washing and restoration is a must. Consult a professional stone cleaning firm on how to go about cleaning, restoring, and protecting your building’s stone façade. And although no two cleaning projects are the same, there are some aspects common to all.
- Inspecting the building – Even if all that you want is a cleaning of the building’s external surface, a thorough assessment of its various problems is necessary. That’s because it’s important to ascertain if the damage (if any) is surface-level or goes deeper. In case of the latter, repairs are performed before any cleaning process starts.
- Creating a cleaning strategy – Once a stone surface has been evaluated for damage, an appropriate cleaning method is chosen. For instance, there are several façade stones that do not take well to acid-based stone cleaning products. The professional cleaner you’ve entrusted the job to will know which cleaning agent is safe for use on your particular stone façade. A thorough clean, even if it’s only with high-pressure water, can restore the stone’s aesthetic appeal instantly.
- Restoring the exterior stone – If your stone façade hasn’t been cleaned for some time now, it might need some buffing, polishing, or other restorative work. This is an important step in returning your building’s look back to how it was.
- Ensuring future protection – Once you’ve achieved the desired look, it’s time to protect the stone from future damage. After the cleaning and polishing procedure is done with, the stone should be sealed so that no water is able to get in. Also mandatory is proper caulking and closing of gaps and cracks in the stone’s vicinity. These measures ensure the stone façade and your building is protected from rust, ice heaves, salt deposits, and water damage for years to come.
- Drawing up a regular maintenance schedule – Stone is like any other exterior material and thus, needs regular cleaning and maintenance. You can contract a cleaning service firm to take care of your building’s stone exterior. Doing so saves you from the eventuality of paying for expensive repairs in the long-term. Moreover, when you clean the building’s stone regularly, water alone is enough to get it spanking clean. And when compared to other stone cleaning methods, washing with water is by far the cheapest.
Stone is beautiful and has a timeless appeal to it that’s unmatched. But contrary to popular perceptions, it needs regular cleaning and maintenance to not only uphold its appearance but also prolong its life.