Roofers in Andoversford
Roof work in Andoversford, a village that grew up where the Stow to Gloucester road crossed the River Coln, with a Victorian tileworks, a railway junction and a postwar council estate.
Andoversford at a glance
- Distance
- 18.7 road miles north-east of Stroud
- Council
- Cotswold District Council
- Setting
- On the River Coln, east of the Cotswold escarpment
- Postwar housing
- Crossfield estate, mid-1950s
Andoversford's roofs, from a ford to the Crossfield estate
Andoversford takes its name from the ford where the Stow to Gloucester road crossed the River Coln, and the ford mattered enough by 759 to give its name to a local estate. Today the village is 18.7 road miles from Stroud, to the north-east, a place where the main road, the river and the old railway lines have all shaped what stands on the ground.
It is a young village by Cotswold standards. The Victoria County History describes a hamlet that grew chiefly in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, with a stone farmhouse, later Home Farm, and an inn, later the Royal Oak, dating from the seventeenth century. The Royal Oak has a mid-eighteenth-century ashlar front. Everything else came later, and it came quickly: a brick and tile works from 1864, two railway lines in 1881 and 1891, a council housing estate in the 1950s and a bypass in 1971.
That sequence matters for a roofer, because each period built roofs in its own way. Roofs of the 1860s are not roofs of the 1950s, and the repairs they need are different. Andoversford was formerly split between the parishes of Dowdeswell, Withington and Whittington, so if you are tracing the history of a house, the records may sit under any of the three. We establish what covers your roof by looking at it and photographing it, and we write it into the survey report before pricing a single line.
Street of stone terraced houses with slate and clay tile roofs 
Row of stone cottages with mossy clay tile roofs along a quiet lane
Chapter 01
The ford on the Coln and the road that made the village
A river crossing, a coaching-age inn and a bypass in 1971.
Chapter 01In this chapter
A village that grew from a river crossing is a village of roads, and Andoversford has had several. The Stow to Gloucester road forded the River Coln, the railways came through in 1881 and 1891, Andoversford Junction closed to all traffic in 1962 and a bypass opened in 1971. A street that carried through traffic for centuries and then stopped carrying it has a particular character: the houses that face the road may be among the oldest, and their roofs may have had the most alterations.
The seventeenth-century stone farmhouse, which later became Home Farm, and the inn that became the Royal Oak are the oldest buildings the record names. The Royal Oak's mid-eighteenth-century ashlar front shows how a seventeenth-century building could be given a smart face a century later without being rebuilt behind it. A roof behind a front like that can be older than the wall in front of it, with early purlins and later patches. On a house of that kind the front says one thing and the roof another, so we survey the roof itself.
Roadside houses and scaffold
A house on a through road needs a scaffold plan that keeps pedestrians safe. A scaffold standing on the pavement needs the highway authority's licence before it goes up, which is why the application and its lead time are set out at the survey and built into the programme. Where the house stands back from the road behind a front garden, the plan is simpler, though materials still have to come in from the road and the waste has to go out.
Why the junction mattered
Andoversford Junction was where two lines met, the Banbury and Cheltenham railway of 1881 and the Midland and South Western Junction of 1891, and the junction closed to all traffic in 1962. A junction brings workers, lodgers and houses built to a pattern for them. Houses of that age commonly share a feature that matters to a roofer: slate or clay on a plain pitch, with a shared chimney stack at the party wall. Where neighbours share a stack, one owner repairing alone often leaves the other side exposed. We raise this early, and where both sides need work we price a shared scaffold as an option.
Beside the river
The Coln is crossed in the village itself, and houses near a river deserve a regular look at gutters, downpipes and the base of the walls. Our gutters, soffits and fascias page sets out the timbers and materials we replace. If the gutters are the cause of damp, we deal with them before talking about the roof covering.
A smart front can hide a much older roof.
Chapter 02
Walter Lawrence's brick and tile works of 1864
A Victorian yard at the north end of the hamlet, and what clay tiles ask of a roofer.
Chapter 02In this chapter
Walter Lawrence opened a brick and tile works at the north end of the hamlet in 1864, and production apparently ended around 1890. What the works tell you is that bricks and clay tiles were being made on the spot at the very moment the railways were arriving, and that the village grew in the same decades.
Clay is a long-lasting covering. MyBuilder puts clay tiles at 40 to 60 years, Marley's page cites a BRE minimum of 60 years, and CORC says over a hundred if well maintained. The sources disagree, and the Building Conservation Directory warns that the often-quoted sixty-year figure is not a reliable guide, given roofs hundreds of years old. What decides life is the quality of the clay, the exposure and the fixing. Nails and battens often fail before the tile does, which is why a clay roof can be re-laid with its own tiles.
Re-laying clay tiles
On a sound old clay roof, a re-lay means stripping the tiles, sorting them, replacing the battens and underlay, and fixing the tiles back with new clips or nails. Broken tiles are replaced from the stack of salvaged ones or from a close match. Our roof replacement page sets out when it makes sense to re-lay and when to renew.
Ridges, hips and fixings
Ridge and hip tiles were traditionally set in a bed of lime or cement mortar, which cracks over time as the roof flexes. Since BS 5534:2014, a mortar bed is not trusted to hold them by itself, and mechanical fixings go in as well. Re-bedding a ridge costs £300 to £600 nationally and repointing a ridge or hip £200 to £400, MyBuilder 2026. A dry-fix system replaces the mortar with mechanical fixings and a ventilated ridge, tested to BS 8612.
Myth: A clay tile roof has a fixed life of sixty years and then needs replacing.
Fact: The sources disagree widely, and the sixty-year figure is not a reliable guide, because the nails, battens and underlay often give out before the tiles do.
Matching an old tile
Hand-made clay varies in colour and edge, and a machine-made replacement shows. When we match a tile, we hold samples against the existing roof in daylight, ask for a few from the same batch and mix them across the slope so the join does not show. Where a roof has been patched in a different tile before, we point it out in the survey rather than repeating the mistake. Photographs of the old and new tiles side by side go in the report, so you can judge the match yourself before any order is placed.
A salvaged tile is only worth keeping if it is sound. We tap each one, since a dull sound can mean a hairline crack, and reject any that are laminated, spalled or chipped at the nib. Rejects are counted and the shortfall is listed on the quote, so the number of new tiles is known before work begins.
Chapter 03
The Crossfield estate and a village's postwar growth
After the Second World War the council chose Andoversford for its main housing development.
Chapter 03In this chapter
After the Second World War the council chose Andoversford for its main housing development. It built the Crossfield estate in the mid-1950s and enlarged it in the 1960s. An estate planned as one scheme is useful to a roofer, because houses along a road can share a design, a covering and an age. When one roof develops a fault, the neighbours may have the same weakness, so a repair on one house can be a warning for the next.
In this chapter
Houses of the 1950s and 1960s commonly share a handful of features: pitched roofs covered in interlocking tiles, a flat-roofed porch or garage, timber fascias and soffits, and a roof void that was built with little insulation. We say commonly, not always. The point is to check each house. Concrete tiles are a long-lived covering; MyBuilder puts them at 30 to 50 years, Marley gives about 60, and CORC 50 or more. The felt beneath often fails first.
Flat roofs and garages
Garages and porches from this period often have flat roofs, and on a sheet roof an old garage may have asbestos cement. HSE guidance treats careful removal of intact sheets as non-licensed work, while substantial breakage makes it notifiable. Our flat roofing page lists the coverings available for the replacement, from felt to EPDM and GRP.
Insulation and VAT
A roof void that was built with little insulation is a good candidate for an upgrade when the roof is being worked on. Fitting insulation in a home's loft or roof is zero-rated for VAT until 31 March 2027, and the remaining roofing work attracts VAT at the usual rate. The quote shows which applies. Once a re-roof reaches more than 50% of the roof, Part L can require the insulation to be raised to current standards.
Fascias, soffits and bargeboards on estate houses are timber or uPVC, and MyBuilder's 2026 guide gives national ranges per metre for each: soffit £100 to £180, fascia £80 to £150 and guttering £30 to £70. Replacing them together shares the scaffold between the three, and the saving shows on the written quote.
- 1864year Walter Lawrence opened his brick and tile works
- 1950sdecade the Crossfield estate was built, enlarged in the 1960s
- 1971year the Andoversford bypass opened
Map showing Andoversford and the Stroud service radius, with nearby towns we also cover.
Near Andoversford
Roof work we do here
The Crossfield estate and the old Coln ford
My Andoversford house has an old stone front and a newer roof behind. How do you survey it?
From both sides and from the loft. The front wall may be older or smarter than the roof behind it, and the timbers often belong to a different period from the covering, so we photograph the junctions and write down what each part is made of before pricing.
Can clay tiles on an older Andoversford house be re-laid rather than replaced?
Often, if the tiles are sound. A re-lay strips the tiles, fits new battens and underlay and fixes the old tiles back, with broken ones replaced from a close match. The quote shows what is re-used and what is new.
Our Crossfield estate house has a flat garage roof. What are the options?
The usual coverings are felt, EPDM and GRP, with typical national costs of about £70 to £150 per m² depending on the one chosen, MyBuilder 2026. We check the deck and the fall, then the quote prices the preferred option and any alternative.
Is there a conservation area in Andoversford that affects roof work?
Andoversford itself is not a designated conservation area, though neighbouring Dowdeswell, Whittington, Sevenhampton and Shipton each have one. Cotswold District Council's planning team can confirm whether a house is listed, and we recommend asking them before any change of material.