Patios, walls and driveways in Barbados

What we build outside

• Patios and terraces — laid to falls, drained, and detailed so they do not push water back at the house.
• Covered verandahs and pergolas, framed and fixed for wind rather than for a photograph.
• Timber and composite decking, with substructures specified to survive termites and moisture.
• Boundary walls, gates and piers, founded properly and drained where they retain.
• Driveways and hardstanding — concrete, pavers or gravel, with the sub-base that decides whether they last.
• Pool surrounds, coping and terraces. We build around pools; we do not build the pool shell itself.
• Outdoor kitchens, bars and built-in seating.
• Steps, ramps, planters and site walls.

What separates outdoor work that lasts

Falls and drainage

Every hard surface has to shed water, away from the building, to somewhere that can take it. Flat patios pond, ponding gets into the structure, and the paving lifts. The fall is set before anything is laid, not adjusted afterwards.

The sub-base

Driveways and patios fail from underneath. A compacted sub-base of the right depth is invisible, unglamorous and the entire reason one driveway is still flat after ten years and the one next door is not.

Fixings and materials

Anything outside near the sea is in a corrosive environment. Ordinary fixings rust out and stain, then fail. Stainless or properly galvanised fixings cost slightly more once and save the whole job.

Wind

A pergola or a carport roof is a sail. It has to be fixed down into something that can hold it, or in the first serious blow it becomes debris — and debris is what breaks other people's windows.