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Exposed Aggregate Driveway & Drainage — Point Chevalier
A Point Chevalier front yard where the house sits 2 m above the street and the driveway is the low point between the two. Old uneven pavers, and water with nowhere to go. Drainage is what triggered the job, so drainage is where the design started. Six weeks, 70 m² poured.
What was there before
An old paver driveway, uneven and past it, at the lowest point on the site. Water came off the street and off the house and collected there, which is what prompted the call. The path from the street to the side of the house had a very steep last 2 m that was awkward every time anyone used it. The front yard was already held by a retaining wall with stairs.
What the client wanted
Fix the drainage, and while the front yard was open, make the rest work: a driveway that looks like it belongs to the house, and a path you can walk up without thinking about it. The retaining wall was sound but looked tired, so it needed bringing back rather than replacing. Somewhere to hide the bins was on the list too.
What made it hard
You cannot drain a low point by falling water away from it; there is nowhere for it to go. So the fix had to be designed rather than laid. We spent real time on the falls with laser levels, working out which way water would run once the new surface was in, and where it had to end up. Every height and fall across 70 m² was set around that answer before any concrete was ordered.
What we built, and how the aggregate was exposed
About 8 × 3 m along the garage, a 4 m return behind it, 2 m across the garage front, and a 14 m path from the street to the side of the house. The slab is 110 mm, 25 MPa, 665 mesh with a D12 border, saw-cut next day at 3 m maximum, cuts lined up with corners.
Surface: 20 mm Mangatangi exposed aggregate from Atlas Concrete, 3 kg of black oxide per cubic metre for a darker, warmer tone, with Uruti pebble borders from Central Landscape Supplies. Exposing aggregate is a sequence of timed judgements: bullfloat, steel-finish, apply a retarder that slows the curing of the top layer only, then wash the slurry off. Knowing when to stop trowelling, when to apply the retarder and when to wash is the job, and none of it can be redone. The stone is too large for most concrete pumps, so all 70 m² was barrowed in, a sucker truck taking the slurry. No sealer.
The screen is horizontal 140 × 32 mm H3.2 slats at 10 mm spacing, oiled, hiding the bins and a water tank. The retaining wall was cleaned, jet washed, primed and finished in two coats of Resene Lumbersider in a CoolColour.
Consents, drainage and who did what
No consent was needed and the vehicle crossing was not touched. A stainless channel drain runs along every side of the garage into a new cesspit set at the low point of the driveway, and Wilson Plumbing, licensed, connected it to the stormwater system. Everything above ground on this job was ours, front yard to street edge.
What made it hard
You cannot drain a low point by falling water away from it; there is nowhere for it to go. So the fix had to be designed rather than laid. We spent real time on the falls with laser levels, working out which way water would run once the new surface was in, and where it had to end up. Every height and fall across 70 m² was set around that answer before any concrete was ordered.
What we built, and how the aggregate was exposed
About 8 × 3 m along the garage, a 4 m return behind it, 2 m across the garage front, and a 14 m path from the street to the side of the house. The slab is 110 mm, 25 MPa, 665 mesh with a D12 border, saw-cut next day at 3 m maximum, cuts lined up with corners.
Surface: 20 mm Mangatangi exposed aggregate from Atlas Concrete, 3 kg of black oxide per cubic metre for a darker, warmer tone, with Uruti pebble borders from Central Landscape Supplies. Exposing aggregate is a sequence of timed judgements: bullfloat, steel-finish, apply a retarder that slows the curing of the top layer only, then wash the slurry off. Knowing when to stop trowelling, when to apply the retarder and when to wash is the job, and none of it can be redone. The stone is too large for most concrete pumps, so all 70 m² was barrowed in, a sucker truck taking the slurry. No sealer.
The screen is horizontal 140 × 32 mm H3.2 slats at 10 mm spacing, oiled, hiding the bins and a water tank. The retaining wall was cleaned, jet washed, primed and finished in two coats of Resene Lumbersider in a CoolColour.
Consents, drainage and who did what
No consent was needed and the vehicle crossing was not touched. A stainless channel drain runs along every side of the garage into a new cesspit set at the low point of the driveway, and Wilson Plumbing, licensed, connected it to the stormwater system. Everything above ground on this job was ours, front yard to street edge.
Why it cost what it cost
Do not take the cheap quote on a job like this. The number covers time nobody can see: laser levels across the front yard, working out where the water goes, and a cesspit placed to suit that answer rather than the concrete. Then 70 m² barrowed by hand because the stone is too big to pump, and a retarder wash with three timing calls you cannot repeat. A plain broom-finish drive skips all of it, and drains the way it did before.
A note on reviews
Not every job produces a review, and we don't chase them. The ones we have are on Google, all from Auckland homeowners who had us on their property for four to eight weeks — which is a longer look at how a crew actually works than most reviews anywhere are based on.
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