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Wall types in London homes, and what they mean for a fixing

Plaster is a finish. The holding power of a screw lives in whatever is behind it. These bands describe backgrounds that turn up often in London. They are not a survey of your wall.

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Solid brick, with plaster

A large share of Victorian and Edwardian houses are brick. The inside face may be a sand-and-cement or lime plaster applied straight to that brick. Tapped with a knuckle, it tends to sound dull rather than hollow, though a thick plaster can blur the sound.

A masonry fixing is the usual family of plug for a solid background, and it has to reach the brick, not stop in the plaster. Plaster alone is a poor hold for a loaded cupboard. The drill, the plug and the screw still have to match each other and the load the leaflet states. This page does not give a diameter or a depth, because those belong to the fixing maker’s data and to the wall in front of you.

Lath and plaster

Many rooms that have never been fully replastered still have timber laths with plaster pushed between them. The surface can sound more lively, crack in a web, and move slightly under a firm press. A short plug in the plaster may meet a lath, a gap, or a brick further back.

Drilling here can blow the plaster off the laths over a wide patch. If the room is rented, listed, or simply old and intact, that risk is a reason to pause and ask the person responsible for the building before any hole is made. A fixing that needs to carry a wardrobe should reach a background that can take it, which may be masonry or a stud, not the lath itself.

Black kitchen cabinets and a wooden worktop in front of an exposed brick wall
Exposed brick is only one finish. The same house may have board on dabs a few metres away. Photograph: Lisa Anna, Pexels.

Plasterboard on dabs

A common later lining is plasterboard stuck to masonry with dabs of adhesive. There is a void. A short fixing holds only the board, which is not a support for a wall cabinet or a tall restraint. A longer fixing may reach the brick if it is aimed at a dab or through the void into solid material, and it may also miss and spin in the gap.

Sound is a clue, not a proof. Hollow taps between dabs and a duller tap on a dab are typical, and they can be misleading next to a flue or a change of construction. When the load is more than a light frame, the person doing the work needs to know which background the screw will actually enter.

Stud partitions

Conversions, new internal walls and a lot of post-war flats use plasterboard on timber or metal studs. The void is real. A hollow-wall fixing is designed for board with space behind it. A screw into a timber stud, found and confirmed, is a different and often stiffer hold. Metal studs need the fitting the stud system allows.

Studs are commonly spaced at regular centres, but older alterations ignore the pattern. A magnet or a stud finder is a hint. The proof is the screw meeting solid material where you expected it. Do not assume a party wall between flats is a simple stud you may cut into.

Block and concrete

Some mansion blocks, ex-local authority flats and later houses have concrete frames, concrete panel walls, or lightweight block. The surface may still be plaster or board, so the face does not announce the structure. Concrete can be dense enough that an ordinary masonry bit makes little progress. That is information, not a reason to force a larger hole.

Fixings for concrete are a distinct range. The structural drawing, if the building has one, and the managing agent are better sources than a guess from the paint colour.

Cables, pipes and flues

In modern work, cables often run horizontally or vertically from a socket or a switch. Older houses are less predictable: lighting drops, abandoned points and pipes in boxing turn up in the middle of a wall. A radiator on the wall, or a bathroom the other side of it, is a reason to expect a pipe. A chimney breast may be brick at the edges and a flue, empty or lined, toward the middle. Do not treat the whole breast as solid fixing ground.

A pipe or cable detector is a check, not a certainty. If the route of a service is unknown and the fixing is not trivial, stop and find out. Nothing in this note is an instruction to drill.

Leases and shared walls

A great many London homes are leasehold. Leases often limit what may be fixed to, or cut into, the structure, and they distinguish the tenant’s interior from the landlord’s walls. Asking the freeholder or the managing agent, and reading the lease, is the ordinary step before a heavy fixing. This publication does not give legal advice and does not read leases.

Party walls between houses or flats are shared. Chasing them, or loading them, can be a matter for the neighbour and for the building, not only for the room you are furnishing.

Related reading: flat-pack checks, kitchen plans, and restraints after fitting.

Reading a wall without turning it into a survey

You can learn a lot before any hole. You cannot learn everything. A tap, a socket position and the age of the house are clues. They are not a specification for a plug.

  1. Sound

    A solid brick wall under plaster usually answers a knock with a dull, short note. Board on dabs often has a hollow patch between the dabs and a harder note where a dab sits. A stud wall sounds hollow between the studs and firmer on the timber. None of this tells you the stud spacing, the cavity, or whether a flue is present. It only tells you not to treat the whole wall as one material.

  2. Switches and sockets

    A plastic pattress that sits proud of old plaster sometimes means the cable is surface-run in mini-trunking, or that the box is shallow. A socket flush in a chimney breast may be in a chased brick face or in a later lining. Do not open electrical accessories to find out. Note their position so furniture does not cover them, and keep fixings away from the vertical and horizontal lines where cables are commonly buried.

  3. The breast

    A chimney breast is not automatically a solid fixing ground. Flues, gathered brickwork above a fireplace, and plasterboard linings all occur. A disused fireplace may still be a flue. Furniture in front of a breast is a measuring problem, described on the wardrobe sheet. Fixing into the breast is a different problem and may be the wrong place entirely.

  4. Lease and party wall

    In a flat, the lease can restrict alterations, including fixings into walls the landlord treats as structural or as demised in a particular way. A party wall between houses is shared. This page does not interpret a lease and does not say which wall is yours to drill. If the document is unclear, that is a question for the freeholder, the managing agent, or a solicitor you instruct. The name of this website does not make the notes legal advice.

If you suspect asbestos in an old boarding, textured coating, or flue panel, stop and get advice from someone qualified to identify it. This publication does not identify materials from a description or a photograph. The same limit is stated on the floors sheet.