Garden fencing, built on site to the right spec.

A fence that lasts is a spec thing, not a magic thing. Properly treated posts, concreted in with postcrete. Gravel boards at the base so the timber isn't sitting in wet soil. Arris rails notched in properly. Feather-edge boards overlapped, usually by about 25mm, so the line doesn't gap out when the timber moves. Capping rail along the top to keep the water off the end grain. That's the proper spec. Drop the capping, use cheap posts, skimp on the overlap, and you'll be looking at it again in five.

Most of the garden fencing that fails early didn't fail at the boards. It failed at the posts. That's why the post installation is the part we take longest over, and it's the part you can't inspect once the job is done. Worth knowing when you're comparing quotes: two fence installers can price the same run of close-board and be describing two different fences.

We build close-board, panel, post and rail, stock fencing, picket and gates, and we repair what's worth saving. Domestic and smallholding work, across East Sussex, mostly within twenty miles of Heathfield. We'll tell you honestly when a repair is the right call and when the run has gone and is dragging the rest down with it.

Most of a fence installation is groundwork. We mark the line out with you first, agree where it runs and which side the posts sit, then dig. Post holes go about three feet down, spacing set by the run and the boards. Ground conditions move the day: clay round Battle digs differently to the sandstone nearer Hastings.

Then the post installation, which is the part that decides how long the fence stands. Properly treated timber posts or concrete posts, set plumb and concreted in with postcrete, left to go off before anything is hung on them. Gravel boards go in along the base. After that the arris rails get notched in, the feather-edge or the panels go on, and the capping rail finishes the top.

A standard garden fence run is usually a day or two. It's noisy while we're digging, and there'll be spoil from the holes and the old fence to move. We clear as we go, sweep the patio and blow the drive off before we leave. You'll know which day we're coming and roughly what time we'll be off the drive.

Round-section posts driven into the slope, two-rail, hand-cleft so the rails kept their natural taper. Looks like it grew there. Stock side kept clean throughout, no dropped wood in the rape.

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