Structural openings
Load-bearing walls taken out on steels or brick arches: kitchen-diners knocked through, chimney breasts removed, wide openings formed and made good.
Knocking two rooms into one is the job we are asked about most, and the one where the wall is the cheap part. A realistic price covers the temporary support, the steel, the bearings each end and the making good. Anyone quoting only the beam is quoting a quarter of the job.
A steel or an arch
In most houses the answer is a steel beam hidden in the ceiling. In solid-brick Victorian and older houses, and anywhere the owner wants the wall to stay honest, we build a segmental brick arch over timber centring instead. It carries the load in the same material as the wall and it will outlast the fixings on any beam.
What it costs
A 4-metre opening in a load-bearing wall with a steel, padstones and full making good is about £7,000 to £8,500 including VAT. The first visit and the written quote are free.
Finished jobs, with budgets
Common questions
Openings and masonry
How do we know if a wall is load-bearing?
Often you cannot tell from the room side. We look at which way the floor joists run, what sits above and what the wall is built from, and the engineer confirms it before we price the beam.
Should our old house be repointed in lime?
If it has solid walls and was built before about the 1920s, almost certainly. Cement traps water in soft brick and stone. We mix lime on site and match the old joint.
Other services
Get a fixed price for your structural opening
A free site visit, then a line-by-line written quote within five working days of the drawings. We are booking starts from March 2027. Site visits within 10 working days.