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Truro is a cathedral city at the head of a tidal river, not a seaside resort, and the difference matters to a decorator. The city sits in a bowl where the Kenwyn and the Allen meet and run down into the Truro River and the Fal estuary, so the damp you are painting over is river and rain damp that sits in the ground and in the walls, rather than the sea spray of a beach town. It has flooded from its rivers and the tide within living memory, and ground-floor joinery in the centre carries that history.
The work runs across three kinds of building. There are the Georgian and Victorian painted frontages of the city centre — stucco, render and sash joinery, a good deal of it listed or within the conservation area, where material and colour are governed rather than chosen. There is the older Cornish stock, granite and rubble stone under lime render, and slate-hung elevations which are the local answer to a very wet climate. And there is the commercial and retail redecoration of a busy administrative and shopping centre, plus the holiday-let and second-home turnaround work generated across the wider Cornish catchment the city serves.
Most of the exposure a decorator carries is not falling off a ladder. It is a run of overspray drifting onto a parked car in a narrow street, a tray of stripper going over on a client’s floor, and — specific to this part of the world — the exterior coating that fails early because it went onto damp granite or lime-rendered rubble stone. The south-west peninsula sits in the most severe wind-driven rain exposure band in the country, and a system chosen as though for an inland town will not last here. Apex arranges cover that reflects how the trade actually works in Cornwall, placed by a named broker who will present your risk properly to insurers who understand it.
What you are painting, and what it is made of, drives the risk here far more than the size of the job does.
Driving rain is the defining local condition. The south-west peninsula is the most exposed part of the United Kingdom for wind-driven rain. Exterior systems that perform perfectly in a sheltered inland town fail early here, and the client who paid for the work will not usually accept that the weather was the problem. Specifying for exposure, rather than for the datasheet, is what stops that becoming a dispute.
Breathability on historic fabric. Lime render, cob, granite and slate hanging all rely on being able to let moisture out. Impermeable coatings hold it in, and the damage — blown render, decayed timber, spalled stone, damp interiors — appears long after you have been paid. That is a workmanship and professional argument, not a make-good, and it is the most avoidable claim in the trade in Cornwall.
Short and unreliable dry windows. External programmes here slip because the weather does not co-operate, and a fresh coating caught by driven rain before it has cured is contract works territory. Building realistic weather allowance into a programme is a commercial protection as much as a technical one.
The Work at Height Regulations 2005 — central to nearly every external job, whether from a tower, a ladder or a full scaffold.
COSHH duties on solvents, strippers, isocyanate-containing spray products and the dust from sanding and preparation.
Hot works permit and fire-watch conditions from insurers where a heat gun or blowtorch is used to strip old paint from historic joinery.
CDM 2015 duties on larger contracts and repeat commercial redecoration schemes.
Listed building consent and conservation area controls, which reach external finishes, materials and in some cases colour.
Spray drifts in the wind and settles on a parked car, shop glazing or a neighbour’s frontage in a narrow city-centre street — public liability responds, subject to policy terms.
A tin of emulsion or a tray of stripper goes over onto flooring or furnishings in an occupied property or a holiday let — public liability responds, subject to the wording.
A heat gun or blowtorch stripping old paint from Georgian joinery ignites dry timber behind a reveal or a soffit — a hot works incident, where the permit and fire-watch conditions bite.
An impermeable coating specified for a lime-rendered or slate-hung elevation traps moisture, and the wall behind it decays — professional indemnity territory rather than public liability.
This is the exposure that matters most for decorators and it is exactly what public liability is for — overspray onto cars, glazing or neighbouring paintwork, spilt paint or stripper on a client’s floor, and damage done while working in an occupied room. Wordings vary on spray and treatment risk, so it is worth checking that the policy fits how much spraying and preparation you actually do rather than assuming it does.
The technical risk is trapping moisture. Slate hanging and lime render work by shedding water while letting the wall behind breathe, and an impermeable modern coating defeats that.
Often, and it is worth establishing before you quote. Listed building consent can reach external finishes and materials, and conservation area controls can reach colour as well.
Typically yes, subject to conditions — usually a hot works permit and a fire-watch period after you finish. On Georgian and Victorian joinery with layered paint and dry timber behind the reveals, that is a serious condition rather than a formality. Chemical and infrared stripping are worth considering on the most sensitive fabric.
It matters to the consequence of running late or causing damage. A changeover programme has no slack in it, and a room out of service costs the owner a booking. It also means you are frequently working in empty, unattended property, which affects both tool security and the length of time a problem goes unnoticed.
Tell us about your business and we’ll place it on the specialist market — or leave your number and a named broker calls you back, usually the same working day.
