Driveway & paving guide
Resin, block or tarmac — and what goes underneath.
Most people ring us already knowing they want the drive done and not much else. This is the plain-English version of the conversation we'd have on site: what each surface actually does, where it wins, where it doesn't, and why the part you can't see matters more than the part you can.
Driveway surfaces compared
There is no single best surface — there's the one that suits your frontage, your budget and how the water behaves on your plot. Here's the honest version of each.
Resin bound
Smooth, seamless and permeable. Water drains through the surface instead of running off toward the road, there are no joints for weeds to find, and the aggregate colour can be matched to the stone of the house. The most premium-looking of the three, and the one that asks least of you afterwards — a sweep and an occasional wash. It does need a sound, properly prepared base underneath, so it isn't the surface to skimp on.
Block paving
The most versatile: dozens of colours, sizes and finishes, laid in herringbone, stretcher bond or basketweave with a contrasting border. Immensely hard-wearing, and individual blocks lift and go back if a trench is ever dug or one gets stained. Joints need re-sanding and the odd weed pulled every now and then — the trade-off for being the easiest surface in the world to repair invisibly.
Tarmac
The practical option for a bigger drive. Quick to lay, smooth, quiet underfoot, sheds water fast and costs less per square metre than the other two. It takes a crisp block or kerb edging to look smart rather than municipal — which is how we always finish it — and it handles awkward falls and long rural accesses better than a jointed surface.
Gravel & loose stone
Cheap, fast-draining and fine behind a gate, but it migrates onto the pavement, sits in the treads of your shoes and needs topping up. If it's the look you're after rather than the price, resin bound gets you the same aggregate finish without any of the wandering.
Paving for the back garden
Patios take less load than a drive but far more scrutiny — you sit on them, in daylight, for hours. Material and falls matter.
Porcelain
Large-format porcelain is dimensionally near-perfect, so joints stay uniform and the whole terrace reads as one flat plane. It barely stains, doesn't go green the way some natural stone does, and comes in everything from pale marbled greys to convincing timber effects. The premium choice for a modern garden, and the one we lay most often.
Indian sandstone
Riven natural stone with real texture and colour variation underfoot — warmer and more forgiving than porcelain, and the natural fit for a stone-built Yorkshire property. Wants sealing and an occasional clean, and every pack has variation in it, which is exactly the point.
Setts, borders & edgings
A dark sett or a soldier course around a terrace or lawn is what makes a garden look designed rather than assembled. It also gives the paving something solid to finish against, which is what stops edges dropping a few winters on.
Artificial grass
Not paving, but it lives in the same conversation. Laid on its own drainage layer and a compacted, levelled base, cut to curved borders and pinned with glued seams, it gives you a usable green lawn in December — which a real one, in a shaded Yorkshire garden with a dog in it, will not.
The bit you never see
Every surface on this page is only as good as what it's sitting on. This is where the money quietly goes, and where corners get cut on a cheap quote.
Excavation to depth
Digging out to the right depth for the surface and the load — and carting the spoil away rather than burying it at the bottom of the garden. Too shallow a dig is the single most common reason a driveway ruts and sinks.
Sub-base & compaction
Crushed stone laid in layers and compacted with a plate or roller, not just tipped and raked. This is the structure. Everything on top is a wearing surface.
Falls & drainage
Water has to go somewhere, and it should never be toward the house. We set falls across the whole area, add channel drains and aco where the ground dictates, and use permeable surfaces where surface water can't be sent to the road.
Edge restraint
Kerbs and edgings bedded and haunched in concrete hold the whole field together. Without them, blocks creep, tarmac crumbles at the margins and a resin edge cracks — usually somewhere obvious.
None of this can be settled properly over the phone. The site visit and the written quotation are free — we'll walk the drive or the garden with you, tell you which surface we'd actually use and why, and put a clear price to it with no obligation to go ahead.
Talk it through on site.
We'll tell you which surface we'd actually put on your frontage and why — free site visit, written quotation, no obligation.