From brick to render to hardieplank and many more, your homes apearance will be governed by it's external finish.
Although paint is an external finish, we will not be covering it here, so for more info on paint click here. What we will be covering is any material used to form the solid external layer of your home.
Click on any of the above to move directly to that section.
Please let us know if you know of other external finishes that are not on this list.
Brick
For many many years brick has been the favourite for external finishing, it looks great, is longlasting, has good insulating properties and there is a massive range to choose from. You can use brick to build your walls and then render over them, or choose a feature brick for your external finish.
Brick is a very strong material and will take almost any punishment without breaking or cracking, and if a brick does get damaged it is relatively easy to replace it.
The image on the right dispays a home using a red brick as an external finish, but is also using rendered bands for extra effect. Using this brick and render combination you can design some awesome effects for the facade of your home, giving it a special uniqueness.
Not only can brick be used as an external finish, but it can also be used as a frame material. A double brick home will have brick outside and also inside, or you can build a brick veneer home, with brick outside and timber/metal inside. For more information on this subject please see our frame materials page.
Render
House rendering is becoming more and more popular each day, old brick homes are being rendered to increase their appeal and value, and new homes are being rendered due to the smooth and highly attractive finished product.
The flexibility with rendering is the major attraction, as you can render small sections of your home, like the image above with rendered bands highlighting the windows and doors, or just a feature line.
Rendering half of the wall like the image directly above, utilizing a border brick to define the break between, giving the house a cleanly designed look. Or you could render the whole building, like the image below, giving the entire building a smooth clean look with sharp defined angles.
You can have rendered bands, rendering around windows and doors, feature sections, a feature brick band, again, like the image above, and many other design additions. The scope for rendering is only bounded by your imagination.
The other advantage of rendering is the ability to paint the render any colour, allowing you the luxury of changing the colour anytime easily. That way you don't have to worry so much about the possibility of clashing colours, just change them later.
There will be other reasons why rendering is an excellent choice, but the above ideas show you why more and more people are using render to enhance the look of their home.
Stone
under construction
Concrete
Concrete is usually used on commercial and industrial buildings, but can also be used to build your home. Concrete pannels come in various sizes and shapes, from wall pannels to pillars