Why you shouldn't render your brick home

Own a brick home and hate it? Rendering is often the one and only solution in people’s minds when it comes to modernising a brick home. After all, you’ve no doubt seen amazing transformations on TV or even in your suburb and thought ‘I can do that!’

However, I’m here to convince you that rendering is not the only way to overhaul a brick home. I’ve helped dozens of my clients completely refresh and modernise brick dwellings – you can see some of the amazing and inspiring transformations here – even without rendering them.

Most often, your decision to render or not will come down to the cost; and this can vary from a few thousand dollars to over $20,000 depending on the size of the house and the wall areas to be rendered. Also take into consideration that the additional painting, maintenance, and other costs associated with rendering can really begin to spiral out of control.

Now, I do want to say here that I have helped equally as many home owners successfully render their homes as not. I’m not opposed to rendering at all: I love what results you can achieve with it, but it just isn’t the right solution for every brick home.

A good way to work out whether rendering is the right thing for your home or investment property is to begin with why you’re doing it. If it’s your own home and you’re planning to live there for the long term, then go for it: do what will help you enjoy the property most, as long as it fits into your budget.

If you’re planning on selling your home or it’s an investment property, then my advice is to only do it if the numbers stack up.

Ask yourself; what will it cost to render the home (including associated renovation work) versus how much value will it add to the property? You can often work out the feasibility of rendering or not, just by comparing to other houses in your area.

Consider properties of around the same dwelling and land size as well as the number of bedrooms and bathrooms. Do some research into how much properties similar to yours, but rendered, are selling for. Check out Sold listings on Domain, before committing either way.

How to update without rendering

If I’ve convinced you enough and you’ve decided perhaps rendering isn’t for you, you’ll want some clever techniques to lighten, brighten and modernise the overall look of your home in some alternative ways.

Painting the trims (windows, guttering/fascias), and roof is, of course, an excellent way to transform a brick home. I personally am not a fan of white trims on a brick house as I think there are plenty of other great options; greys of all shades and tones especially.

If your brick is very dark, then lightening the trims is an obvious solution to creating a fresher, more modern appearance. If the brick is lighter in colour, then darker trims can create a contrast that dramatically modernises the house’s appearance.

As previously mentioned, I would generally select some sort of grey for these areas; but which one to choose? Greys come is all manner of shades and tones – green-based greys, blue-based greys, purple-based greys, warmer greys and so on. Greys can be very light or very dark or somewhere in between. Generally, the most appropriate shade and tone of colour for the project will be determined by the colour of brick you’re working with.

Once you’ve got your paint colour right, it’s onto the landscaping. The species and layout of plants is going to depend on the location, shape and orientation of your property. But one thing is consistent when it comes to choosing landscaping for a brick home; it generally needs to be “chunky”. Plant species that are too fine will blend away too much with the visual weight of the house brick. Your plant selections need to hold their own in relation to the brick. Also, the colours of the plants should contrast with the house somewhat. For instance, If the house is a very dark brick, select lighter coloured plants so they stand out more.  If the house is a lighter coloured brick then darker green and even black species of plants work well visually.

These are just a few techniques you can use for modernising a brick house without rendering it. In addition, you can lighten and brighten or darken/create contrast to other parts of the property to help create a cohesive, modern look. This might include changes to the fences, driveway and paths, mailbox, patio or porch areas and even stair or balcony balustrade.

Jane Eyles-Bennett is renovation mad and has been a professional designer for 23 years. She was a renovation designer on the TV series Property Climbers, winner of several interior design awards and design consultant to over 600 property owners in the past nine years.

Have a renovation or design question? Contact Jane at jane@hotspaceconsultants.com or via her website.