Gloucestershire Roof Cleaning cleans roofs in Painswick: a low-pressure clean or a manual moss scrape, finished with a biocide treatment. Most roof cleans are £550–£950, including a free gutter clear and a 2-year moss-free guarantee. Need the gutters done on their own? See gutter cleaning in Stroud, which covers Painswick, from £90.
Free gutter clearance and free biocide on every Painswick roof clean. Honey-stone, listed and conservation-area cottages in the Queen of the Cotswolds handled correctly.
Painswick is often called the Queen of the Cotswolds. It's a cloth village, built by clothiers and weavers from the local honey-coloured limestone, and more than 380 of its buildings are listed — 17th and 18th-century cottages and clothiers' houses, nearly all under traditional Cotswold stone slate. Few villages in England have kept that much of their original stone, and that's the starting point for how we clean it.
The setting does the rest. Painswick is built on the steep western side of the Cotswolds above the valley of the Painswick stream, one of the Five Valleys that run down toward Stroud, with Painswick Beacon rising to over 280 metres behind. Lanes like Tibbiwell drop sharply downhill, houses are stacked one above another on the slope, and many back onto gardens that fall away toward the stream. Damp air rises out of the valley, and a roof on the shady side of a steep street can go most of the winter without properly drying.
Trees add to it. Painswick is a green village — the clipped yews in St Mary's churchyard, gardens full of mature trees, and woodland toward Cranham and the Beacon. Overhanging branches keep roofs in shade, drip on them long after the rain has stopped and drop leaf into valleys and gutters. On a stone-slate roof under trees we usually find thick moss in the laps, lichen on the ridge and gutters part-filled with leaf and moss.
Stone slate is porous and laid in graded courses with deep laps, so it holds water and can't be pressure washed: high pressure splits it and forces water underneath, and a broken slate can only be replaced with reclaimed stone. On Painswick's heritage roofs the moss is removed by hand from a roof ladder, then the biocide goes on. Nothing else is applied.
Newer houses on the edges of the village and along the approach roads tend to have concrete interlocking tile, and the hamlets have a mix of everything. They grow moss on this hillside too. Concrete tile gets a low-pressure clean or a hand scrape, whichever suits it, followed by the same biocide.
Stone slate dominates, but these four cover nearly every roof we're asked to price in the parish.
On the weavers' cottages and clothiers' houses of Bisley Street, Friday Street, Tibbiwell and New Street. The slates are small, porous and laid in graded courses, and once cracked they can only be replaced with reclaimed stone. We clear them by hand from a roof ladder and keep biocide off lime mortar and lead.
On some cottages, outbuildings and later additions, in the village and the hamlets around it. Old clay is soft when wet, so it's scraped by hand on dry days, with care around the bedded ridges, hips and valleys where cracked tiles are most likely.
On some 19th-century houses, chapels and later cottages in the parish. Slate stands up to cleaning better than stone, but its fixings and the lead around it don't; we clear the laps by hand, apply the biocide and leave old flashings and ridge mortar alone.
Marley and Redland interlocking tile on newer houses along the approach roads and toward Stroud. The rough surface catches spores and the valley damp keeps it wet. The moss comes off by hand first, then the biocide.
From the old core around St Mary's out to the hamlets in the parish's valleys. Every street has its own slope, and the access changes with it.
The early-14th-century street that was once the main route between Gloucester and Bisley, holding some of the oldest buildings in the village — tall, shaded stone houses on traditional Cotswold stone slate, much of it listed and on medieval burgage plots, all of it hand-scrape only.
The streets around the old market square and St Mary's church, infilled with cottages from the 17th century — dense honey-stone frontages where shaded north pitches and porous stone slate mean heavy moss and a careful, slow hand-clean.
Tibbiwell drops steeply south-east toward the old wells below the village, and New Street runs past the churchyard — steep gables, tight access and original stone slate that has to be reached off a roof ladder rather than walked on.
The streets where the weavers and cloth workers once lived, lined with renovated 17th and 19th-century cottages — small, close-set roofs in stone and clay that green up fast in the shade and take the standard hand-removal-then-biocide treatment well.
The valley hamlets in the parish — Sheepscombe strung along its brook, Slad of Laurie Lee's Cider with Rosie, and Edge on the western slopes. Small, shaded stone-slate and clay cottages, often holiday lets and second homes, where moss takes hold quickly in the cold, damp valley air.
The wooded eastern edge of the parish toward Cranham and Paradise, and the houses up by Painswick Beacon — exposed, tree-shaded and high, the same mix of heritage stone and later roofs we cover right across the Painswick area.
Painswick was made a conservation area in December 1977 and extended to the south-west in June 1990. Its 380-plus listed buildings run from the Grade I church of St Mary's to the terraces of Bisley Street, Friday Street, Vicarage Street and Tibbiwell, and their stone-slate roofs are a large part of why the village looks as it does. Cleaning one is about removing the growth and leaving everything else — slate, mortar, lead — exactly as we found it.
Moss and algae removal doesn't usually need listed building consent, because it doesn't change the building. Repointing, rebedding a ridge, replacing slates or stripping lead can, and if your roof needs any of that we'll tell you at the survey so you can talk to Stroud District Council's conservation officer before booking. We cover and rinse the edges to keep biocide off lime mortar and leave weathered grey lead alone.
Painswick's prosperity came from cloth. The village appears in the Domesday Book, and in the centuries after it the clothiers built here in stone quarried from the surrounding hills, while wool and cloth went to and from the valley mills by packhorse. The studded "donkey doors" on the old burgage plots are a reminder of that trade. That past is what people value in Painswick, and a roof gone green takes the shine off it.
We check the Historic England list for your address before the survey, so we arrive knowing whether the house is listed and at what grade, and plan the method around it.
We walk the lane or garden to see how a ladder gets to the roof, check the slate and gutters, and write the price down for you. Listed-building or conservation questions are answered at this stage, before anything is booked.
Moss is taken off the stone slate by hand, working from a roof ladder, or a tower where the ground falls away. Gutters are emptied while we're up, and no pressure washer touches the slate.
We apply an approved biocide at the correct strength to kill the algae, lichen and remaining spores. On a hillside this shaded and wooded, it's what keeps the roof clean after we've gone.
Guaranteed against moss, algae and lichen for two years. If regrowth appears in that time, we return and re-treat it at no charge. Written into every quote.
Steep access and hand-cleared stone slate make a Painswick roof a full day's work, so the gutters are cleared on the same visit at no charge, and the biocide comes as standard too.
Gutters in a village this wooded take leaf as well as moss. When they block, the overflow runs down the face of the stone, and on a cottage built into a slope that water has nowhere good to go. We clear them while the ladders are up. The biocide we leave on the slate then carries on working through the next couple of damp seasons, so you aren't calling us back after one winter.
Get my Painswick quoteMost Painswick roofs come in at £550–£950 for moss removal, biocide and a gutter clear together. Larger, steeper or harder-to-reach roofs cost more. In Painswick the access often affects the price more than the size: a cottage on a steep lane where the ladder has to go through the garden takes longer than the same roof on a level street. We'll see it before we price it.
What moves the price:
Always included, never an add-on: a free gutter clear while we're up there, and the biocide that keeps moss off for two years.
How we quote: a free no-obligation survey, a written price the same day, no deposit, pay only when it's done. See our full roof cleaning cost guide → Also worth reading: is roof cleaning safe?, why clean your roof?, how to get rid of roof moss for good and the best time of year to clean a roof.
A Painswick roof clean usually costs £550–£950, with the moss removal, the biocide and a gutter clear all included. Where a roof sits in that range depends mostly on size and access: a cottage on Bisley Street or Tibbiwell that can only be reached through a garden or from a steep lane takes longer to set up than a house on the village edge with a drive, and stone slate is always cleaned by hand, which takes longer than tile. You get a written price after a free survey, with no deposit.
Yes, because nothing we do puts pressure on it. Painswick's stone slate is porous limestone, much of it on 17th and 18th-century weavers' cottages and clothiers' houses, and it breaks easily. We lift the moss out by hand from a roof ladder and then apply biocide, and we never put a coating or sealant on natural stone slate. Newer concrete tile on the edge of the village can have a low-pressure clean if it suits the tile.
Two years, guaranteed. The biocide we apply keeps killing fresh spores after we've left site, and if regrowth appears within two years we come back and re-treat it at no charge. Painswick tests that: the village sits on a steep valley side above the Painswick stream, with trees all round and damp air rising off the valley, so north-facing slate in the narrow streets hardly dries. Without the biocide, moss is usually back within a season or so.
Not when it's applied properly. It's an approved product, mixed to the maker's dilution and put on in dry weather so it stays on the roof. Pets should stay indoors during spraying and for an hour after. On a hillside, run-off heads downhill quickly, so we cover beds and borders, rinse them afterwards and keep an eye on where water drains toward the valley.
Yes. Painswick has more than 380 listed buildings and has been a conservation area since December 1977. We clean listed roofs by hand, never with pressure, sheet and rinse the edges so biocide stays off lime mortar and lead. Taking off moss and algae normally doesn't need listed building consent. Work that touches mortar, lead or slate fixings might, and we'll say so before we start so you can check with Stroud District Council.
Three things together. The village is built on the steep western edge of the Cotswolds, with Painswick Beacon rising to over 280 metres behind it, so damp air climbs out of the valley and hangs about. It's well wooded, so many roofs are shaded by trees as well as by the tall houses opposite. And stone slate is porous, holding water in its deep laps. Shade, damp and porous stone are what moss and algae thrive on.
Only with a roof ladder over the ridge, and only when we have to. Graded stone slates crack underfoot and the old ones can only be replaced with reclaimed stone. Most of the work is done from ladders or a scaffold tower; on plots where the ground drops away we level the tower before anyone climbs. We'll go through the plan for your house at the survey.
Usually, yes. A lot of Painswick is like this — Tibbiwell drops steeply away from the village, and many gardens fall down the valley side. We look at the access at the survey: where a ladder can stand safely, whether a tower needs levelling, and whether we need to come through the garden. If a roof can't be reached safely without scaffolding, we'll tell you up front rather than find out on the day.
To protect the slate — moss keeps stone wet, frost then works on it, and replacement stone slate has to be reclaimed to match. To keep the gutters clear — moss and leaf block them, and overflowing water soaks into porous limestone walls. To keep the house looking as it should — in a village known for its stone, a green roof stands out. A clean costs a fraction of re-slating.
Not on stone slate or old clay, which covers most of the listed cottages in the village. Pressure splits porous slates and forces water under them. Those roofs are cleaned by hand and treated with biocide, and nothing is applied over the stone. A modern concrete-tile roof on a newer house can have a controlled low-pressure clean if that's the right job. We agree the method with you first.
Spring and early autumn are best. The biocide needs dry weather to soak in, and it helps to have it on before the damp months, which are long on this hillside. We clean through the year, but on Painswick's slopes we won't work on wet slate — we wait for a dry window.
Yes — Gloucestershire Roof Cleaning carries £5m public liability insurance.
We had excellent service from start to finish. The guys were very professional, discussed everything over the phone initially then a visit with the drone to allow accurate quarter and expectation management. On the day they were considerate with the neighbours, did a wonderful job with the roof and gutters and cleared up so well that everything looked far better than when they started. Cannot recommend more highly.
We had excellent service from start to finish. The guys were very professional, discussed everything over the phone initially then a visit with the drone to allow accurate quarter and expectation management. On the day they were considerate with the neighbours, did a wonderful job with the roof and gutters and cleared up so well that everything looked far better than when they started. Cannot recommend more highly.
Really impressed with Aquapro Roof cleaning. Very professional guys that done such a good job, that it looks like I’ve had a new roof installed, (after 40yrs of dirt and moss). Blake talked me through everything in detail, and answered any questions I had. Showed me the end result with his drone footage and left house clean and tidy. Highly recommended.
Really impressed with Aquapro Roof cleaning. Very professional guys that done such a good job, that it looks like I’ve had a new roof installed, (after 40yrs of dirt and moss). Blake talked me through everything in detail, and answered any questions I had. Showed me the end result with his drone footage and left house clean and tidy. Highly recommended.
100% recommend this team . From start to finish was kept informed.On the morning a text to say what time they will be there and arrived on time . Worked from 9:30 till 7:30pm on the roof and jet washing all the area after. Very professional and had all the kit even a drone to show you the results of the whole area . The difference is amazing and looks like a new roof . Really happy with the results and so many comments from neighbours too saying how good it looks . You will not be disappointed .
100% recommend this team . From start to finish was kept informed.On the morning a text to say what time they will be there and arrived on time . Worked from 9:30 till 7:30pm on the roof and jet washing all the area after. Very professional and had all the kit even a drone to show you the results of the whole area . The difference is amazing and looks like a new roof . Really happy with the results and so many comments from neighbours too saying how good it looks . You will not be disappointed .
The Guys did a fantastic job on my roof and worked nonstop all day to get the job done and left everything clean and tidy after themselves, highly recommend and would look to use again 👍, made a massive difference to the house.
The Guys did a fantastic job on my roof and worked nonstop all day to get the job done and left everything clean and tidy after themselves, highly recommend and would look to use again 👍, made a massive difference to the house.
Would strongly recommend. Swift with good work quality and kept the surrounding areas tidy. Looks like a new roof! Would 100% recommend.
Would strongly recommend. Swift with good work quality and kept the surrounding areas tidy. Looks like a new roof! Would 100% recommend.
What can I say other than WOW !! Massive thank you to Blake and Dan for all of your hard work, so professional and such an amazing job! Left everything spotless so pleased, highly recommend to everyone. Extremely happy
What can I say other than WOW !! Massive thank you to Blake and Dan for all of your hard work, so professional and such an amazing job! Left everything spotless so pleased, highly recommend to everyone. Extremely happy
From Bisley Street to the valley hamlets, we clean Painswick's stone slate by hand and leave nothing on it but biocide. Gutter clear included, fully insured, and a written price the same day.
