Patios & Paving · 5 min read
Patio drainage and levels: getting it right
A patio that sends water towards the house is worse than no patio at all.
Falls
A patio should fall away from the property at roughly 1:80. Enough to shed water, not enough to notice underfoot or to make furniture rock. The fall is set in the sub-base, not corrected in the mortar bed.
Damp proof course
The finished paving should sit at least 150mm below the damp proof course. Where door thresholds make that impossible, a linear drainage channel or a recessed threshold drain is used to keep water away from the wall.
Where the water goes
- Into planted borders or lawn, where ground conditions allow
- Into a channel drain connected to a soakaway
- Into an existing surface water system, where one exists and permits it
Meeting an artificial lawn
Where a patio meets artificial grass, we set both to the same finished level. It looks intentional, removes a trip hazard and lets the lawn take surface water shed off the paving — provided the lawn's base is built to receive it.