Slate Roofs

The hundred-year covering — what owning one means.

Slate is stone, split thin — and stone doesn't rot, rust or lose its colour. A slate roof properly fixed is the longest-lived covering in Britain: many Victorian and Edwardian roofs still carry their original slates, well past the century. If your house has one, you own the best roof covering there is; the maintenance conversation is about everything holding it up.

Because the failure story of slate roofs is almost never the slate. It's the nails ("nail sickness" — iron fixings rusting through en masse, so sound slates slide off in every wind), the battens softening with age, and the underlay, where one exists at all — many older slate roofs were laid with none, relying on torching (mortar between the slates) that has long since crumbled away.

Reading a slate roof: one or two slipped slates is routine maintenance. Slips appearing across the roof, in different places each winter, with the fallen slates intact — that's nail sickness, and it has a specific, economical remedy.

Benefits

Why choose Slate Roofs

Longest lifespan of any covering — 80 to 100+ years
Completely colourfast and rot-proof
Individually repairable, slate by slate
Sound slates are reusable — re-slating salvages them
Unmatched on period property, and valued at survey

Features

What's included

Welsh, Spanish and reclaimed slate
Hook and tingle refixing for slipped slates
Re-slating on new battens and membrane
Lead valley and flashing details to match
Fibre-cement alternatives where budget leads

Typical lifespan

80–100+ years

Repair options

Repair or replace

Slipped or cracked slates are refixed individually — a standard repair using hooks or lead tingles, since you can't re-nail a slate mid-roof without lifting its neighbours. Nail sickness has its own well-trodden remedy: strip the roof, salvage the slates (usually 60–80% reusable), and re-slate them onto new battens and breathable membrane with copper or stainless nails. The roof keeps its slates and its character; the fixings restart the clock for another lifetime.

Common questions

Frequently asked

Slates keep sliding off but they're not broken — what's happening? +

That's the classic signature of nail sickness: the slates are fine, the iron nails holding them have rusted to nothing. Refixing each slip individually becomes a treadmill; once slips are general, stripping and re-slating with the salvaged slates on new fixings is the economical fix.

Are my old slates worth anything? +

Genuinely, yes — good reclaimed Welsh slate commands real prices, which tells you something about its remaining life. It also means a re-slate quote should credit the value of your reusable slates, and any roofer keen to cart them away cheaply deserves questions.

Can I walk on a slate roof? +

Please don't — slate is strong in the weather and brittle under a boot, and every walked-on slate roof we see carries the cracked evidence. Proper access is roof ladders and boards that spread the load; it's one reason slate work is priced with access in mind.