Patios & Paving

Patios and general paving cover flagged or slabbed areas — concrete, porcelain or natural stone units — laid on a mortar bed or a compacted sub-base, jointed and pointed, and built for garden use, seating areas and pathways rather than the sustained vehicle loading a driveway carries. The choice of unit size, colour and pointing style is usually driven by matching or complementing the house’s existing hard landscaping and the garden’s actual use, and a patio’s long-term performance rests on the base preparation underneath it just as much as any driveway does — a slab laid on a thin bed over unprepared ground will move and crack regardless of the material chosen.

Best suited to: garden seating areas, paths, and outdoor spaces meant for foot traffic and furniture rather than vehicles

Less suited to: any area that needs to carry regular car or van weight

Permeable / SuDS: No — this is an impermeable surface by design, so drainage falls have to be built in at construction rather than relying on the surface itself.