We've just moved into a house that has a garden room built onto the back. The area where it was built has flagstones that predate the newer construction but between the walls and the flagstones is a gap that varies between 95 and about 200mm. Outside the garden room this is just soil with plants growing in it up to the wall but inside the previous owner just dumped a load of pebbles onto it. There is soil underneath the pebbles. Near the wall of the garden room the soil is damp with water coming through from the outside.
The current arrangement is a dirt and dust factory and looks pretty awful. I'd like to replace it with something neater. One consideration is that some of the wall is old and made with lime mortar* so I don't want to just dig it out and put some concrete in the gap since it would stop the mortar breathing. I've thought of two options:
1) Dig it out and put block paving in: so a layer of MOT type 1, a layer of sand and then block paving in the gap. This would be a PITA because I'd have to cut a lot of the blocks because of the size of the gap, but I think it would look good and should be solid.
2) As above but use decking timber instead of block paving: so something like a layer of MOT type 1, then either some bricks or some decking joists and then decking timber over the top to fill the gap. Wouldn't look as good but would be much easier to get the timber to size to fill the gap.
Any thoughts? I've never laid either decking or block paving so what could possibly go wrong? Am I missing a better way to sort this out? Any help gratefully received.
* Previous owner has also repointed some of the lime with portland cement so that will also have to be sorted...
The current arrangement is a dirt and dust factory and looks pretty awful. I'd like to replace it with something neater. One consideration is that some of the wall is old and made with lime mortar* so I don't want to just dig it out and put some concrete in the gap since it would stop the mortar breathing. I've thought of two options:
1) Dig it out and put block paving in: so a layer of MOT type 1, a layer of sand and then block paving in the gap. This would be a PITA because I'd have to cut a lot of the blocks because of the size of the gap, but I think it would look good and should be solid.
2) As above but use decking timber instead of block paving: so something like a layer of MOT type 1, then either some bricks or some decking joists and then decking timber over the top to fill the gap. Wouldn't look as good but would be much easier to get the timber to size to fill the gap.
Any thoughts? I've never laid either decking or block paving so what could possibly go wrong? Am I missing a better way to sort this out? Any help gratefully received.
* Previous owner has also repointed some of the lime with portland cement so that will also have to be sorted...
