Lath & plaster
Plaster is the majority of the visible surface of a valley house, inside and out, and a shortcut in it shows for the life of the building. We hold the C-17 licence ourselves, which is why this work does not get handed off and hoped for.
Most of what you look at.
What the coats do
A conventional exterior is lath over a weather-resistive barrier, then a scratch coat pushed into the lath, a brown coat floated flat, and a finish coat carrying texture and often colour. Each coat has one job, key, plane or appearance, and each needs its own cure before the next goes on.
One-coat systems have their place and are a different product. Which suits your assembly depends on exposure and on what you are matching, so it is worth deciding rather than defaulting.
Heat and wind belong in the spec
Plaster cures by hydration, not by drying out. A July afternoon here pulls water out of a fresh coat faster than the mix can use it, and rushed or unprotected work in that heat gives you a weak, dusty, map-cracked surface.
So we schedule around the day: early starts, shaded elevations, moist curing where it is needed, and stopping when conditions are wrong. A wall placed badly on a hot afternoon is still there in twenty years.
Which cracks matter
Some hairline movement comes with a cementitious finish over a timber frame that shrinks. Control joints, correct lath laps, proper accessories and honest coat thickness keep it hairline.
Diagonal cracks off the corners of openings, or long straight cracks following a framing line, are telling you about the substrate. Resurfacing without reading that first moves the problem rather than fixing it.
Matching, which is the hard part
On an addition the technical work is routine and the difficulty is the join. Texture goes on by hand, so matching a twenty-year-old wall means reading the original technique, aggregate and float pressure, then reproducing it.
We do that in sample panels before anything goes on your house. This is the most common reason a remodel looks remodelled.
- Licence
- NV C‑17 Lath & Plaster #0092664
- Typical scope
- Additions, replastering, remodel junctions, whole elevations
- Matching
- Sample panels before work goes on the house
- Scheduling
- Worked around heat and wind, which affect the cure
Related
Whole-home remodel
Luxury additions & ADUs
Finish carpentry
Talk to us
Tell us what you are building. We will tell you what it involves and where the money usually goes.
Or call (702) 913‑7007 · info@nxgbuilds.com