NEW BUILD PROJECT at Land Adjacent to 1, Thames Place, Putney, London, SW15.

This project is our first new build from footings to roof of a single dwelling. Whilst we have built many extensions from footings to roof's we had never built a complete house before.
It was necessary to become NHBC registered so that the home owner had all the necessary guarantees that should come with a new build such as this.

This involves not only the local building control overseeing all the relevant stages but a building inspector from the NHBC checking our works on a regular basis also.

For instance, the depth of the footings have to be one metre, so we excavated to a metre. Unfortunately even up to a metre we did not come across any solid ground and we were digging out sand which is not suitable for building upon.

So we dug for another metre - still no solid ground, so between us and the building inspectors it was decided that a raft foundation (as opposed to a strip foundation) was the best way forward.
The best way to describe this is when you see someone building an extension on their property you will normally see a trench dug out that is where the outer walls of the building will be built once the trench is inspected and filled with concrete.

In this case the trench would not have been sturdy and solid enough to take a two story house so we laid a slab a metre deep over the whole area that the house was to be built upon. Both the NHBC and the building Control of the local authority were happy with this.

For anyone considering building of any kind, it is best to think about setting some money aside for any unexpected problems such as this.
You have to consider the extra labour involved in digging out a further metre of materials, plant had to be hired to go the extra depth, extra materials were required to lay the raft foundations. None of this would be in the original budget for the job.
Since this problem we moved on really well with this project. The dampcourse was laid and inspected and we moved up to the first floor level as you can see in the pictures. After that, plain sailing and very soon after, the finished article in the last picture!