Roofers in Maidenhead
for slate, tile and
traditional leadwork

The older streets around the town centre, Boyn Hill and the riverside carry Victorian and Edwardian roofs where the vulnerable points are not the slates but the lead. Valleys, chimney flashings, box gutters and parapet details were formed by hand, and after a century of thermal movement the lead splits along the folds and at fixings.

The common mistake is patching those splits with mastic, mortar fillets or flashing tape. It buys a dry winter and then fails again, usually worse, because the water is now trapped behind the patch and soaking the timber. We strip failed details back and re-form them in correctly sized lead with proper welts, clips and expansion allowance.

A huge share of Maidenhead's mid-century housing was finished with sand-and-cement bedded ridge and hip tiles. Mortar has a working life, and across Furze Platt, Cox Green and the post-war estates a great many of those beds are now cracked, hollow or missing altogether.

The tell-tale signs are mortar fragments in the gutter, a ridge tile that has visibly shifted, or damp appearing high in a bedroom ceiling. Left alone, wind gets under the tile, lifts it, and you have both a water ingress problem and a genuine safety risk over a footpath or driveway.

Maidenhead sits in the Thames valley, and the combination of river humidity and mature tree cover on many streets keeps roof surfaces damp for long stretches of the year. Moss and algae hold moisture against slates and tiles, freeze in winter, and accelerate delamination and frost damage.

The same shade and leaf fall blocks gutters and valleys. Water then backs up under the lowest courses, where laps are shortest, and finds its way into fascias, wall plates and rafter feet. Regular maintenance and cleaning is the cheapest roofing work you will ever buy here.

Maidenhead has been extended, converted and dormered heavily over the last forty years, and the junction between old roof and new is where most modern leaks begin. Under-lapped flashings, missing cavity trays, felt turned up too short behind render, and shallow flat sections laid without adequate falls are all routine findings.

Flat roofs on 1970s and 1980s garages and rear extensions are often on their second or third patch. Once the deck is soft, overlaying is a waste of money; we take it back to sound structure, correct the falls, and detail the upstands and outlets so water actually leaves the roof.

Parts of Maidenhead, Bray and Cookham fall within conservation areas, and some properties are listed. That restricts what you may put back: natural slate rather than fibre cement, clay rather than concrete, sand-cast lead rather than a modern substitute, and matching coursing and detailing.

We work in those materials as a matter of course, and we will tell you before we quote if your property is likely to need consent, so you are not part-way through a job with a planning problem.

The named storms that cross southern England each winter reliably strip verges, lift ridges and peel back flat roof coverings. Exposed gable ends and the more open plots towards Pinkneys Green and Bray take the worst of it.

After a storm the priority is making the building watertight and recording the damage properly. Our photographic reports are written so you can pass them straight to an insurer, without us making any claim about what your policy will or will not pay.