Patios in Aylesbury
A patio is the part of the garden you actually stand on — and the part that shows every shortcut. We lay Indian sandstone and large-format porcelain on a full mortar bed, with the falls and the drainage worked out before a single slab goes down.
Indian sandstone
£90–£150 / m²
Multi-size or single-size, buff, autumn or grey silver.
Porcelain
£130–£200 / m²
Large-format, laid on a full bed with a slurry primer.
Ranges, not headline figures — the number depends on access, what has to come out, the edge detail and the drainage. See how the price is built up →
If you're working to a budget
If the quote is above what you had in mind, the usual saving is a smaller, better-detailed patio rather than a cheaper stone on a thinner bed. The same arithmetic applies to drives, and we've set it out in full here.
Is a stone patio right for your garden?
When it's the right choice
- You want a usable outdoor room off the back of the house and you're prepared to pay once for it.
- The area sits in reasonable sun — sandstone and porcelain both look their best dry and lit.
- You want a specific detail: a circular feature, a soldier course following a bay, bullnose steps down to the lawn.
- You need the surface to sit close to a door threshold — porcelain plus a channel drain solves this properly.
When it isn't — say so and pick something else
- It's a deeply shaded, permanently damp corner under trees. Any smooth surface will green over. Riven sandstone or a gravel and stepping-stone treatment will look better for longer.
- You're paving so vehicles can park on it. Patio slabs are not laid or bedded for wheel loads — that's a driveway build and a different price.
- You're on a budget below roughly £90/m² installed. Below that something has to give, and it's almost always the base. We'd rather quote you a smaller patio built properly.
- The ground has been made up recently or backfilled against a new extension. It may need to settle, or the build-up needs re-specifying — we'll tell you if that's what we find.
How we build a patio
Excavate to depth and cart away. Compacted MOT Type 1 sub-base over a separation membrane. Then a full mortar bed — not five dabs of mortar under each corner, which is the single most common cause of rocking, cracked and hollow-sounding slabs. Porcelain gets a slurry primer on the back of every unit so it actually bonds.
The falls are set with a level and a string line before laying, running away from the building at roughly 1:80. Where levels won't allow a fall, an ACO channel drain goes in flush at the house and is connected properly, not left to discharge onto a border.
Edges are the bit people notice: a charcoal or brick soldier course, cut and curved where the house is curved. Manhole covers are recessed and infilled with matching stone wherever the cover type allows it.
The detail that tells you who laid it
An inspection cover, cut and infilled with the same stone so the coursing runs straight through it. It takes an afternoon and almost nobody does it — which is exactly why it's the first thing to look for on anyone's patio photographs.
Patios we've built
Five-year workmanship guarantee, sub-base included
Most guarantees quietly stop at the surface. Ours covers the part you can't see: the excavation depth, the membrane, the compacted sub-base, the falls and the edge restraints. If the ground work moves, we come back and put it right.
A fixed price before anyone starts digging
We measure, agree the build-up in writing and give you one price. It doesn't move unless you change what you've asked for, or unless we open the ground and find something nobody could have known was there — in which case we stop, show you, and agree the cost with you before we carry on.
Common questions about patios
Sandstone or porcelain — which should I choose?
Sandstone is warmer in tone, cheaper, and forgiving: it can be cut on site all day and small variations in thickness are absorbed in the mortar bed. Porcelain is dimensionally perfect, needs almost no maintenance, and stays clean, but it is more expensive, slower to cut, and it must be laid on a full bed with a slurry primer or it will fail. If budget is the deciding factor, sandstone. If you hate maintenance, porcelain.
Why does a patio against the house need a fall?
Water has to leave the paving, and it must never head towards the building. We lay to a fall of roughly 1:80 away from the house. Where the levels don't allow it — a terrace level with a bi-fold threshold, for example — the water is caught in a channel drain at the house and taken away. This is the step most commonly skipped, and it's why so many patios end up with a damp wall behind them.
What is a channel drain and do I need one?
It's a slot drain, usually an ACO channel, set flush along the edge of the paving and connected to a soakaway or surface water drain. You need one where the terrace sits close to floor level, where the ground rises away from the house, or where a large area drains towards the building. We'll tell you at the quote stage whether yours needs one and it will be in the price.
Can you hide the manhole cover?
In most cases yes. A recessed cover tray replaces the standard cover and is infilled with the same stone or porcelain, cut around it, so the cover reads as part of the pattern. It still lifts for access. It costs more than leaving the metal cover in place, and we'll show you the price separately so you can decide.
How long does a patio take?
A typical 30–40m² patio is four to six working days: excavation and cart away, sub-base, then laying, cutting and pointing. Circular features, curved soldier courses, steps, recessed covers and drainage all add time, and any of them can add a day.
Do you point with mortar or a jointing compound?
Both, depending on the job. A resin jointing compound is the better answer on porcelain and on tightly-jointed sandstone: it stays flexible, resists weeds and won't stain the surface if used correctly. Traditional mortar pointing suits wide, irregular joints in riven stone. We'll say which we're proposing and why.
Towns we cover
We're based in Aylesbury and work about ten miles around it.
- Aylesbury
- Bierton
- Stoke Mandeville
- Weston Turville
- Aston Clinton
- Wendover
- Waddesdon
- Wingrave
- Whitchurch
- Quainton
- Wing
- Haddenham