The brief
When a villa needs the walls and the driveway doing, the order you do them in decides whether it looks right at the end.
Two separate problems were in play here. The walls had the growth you get on any Algarve render given enough warm, humid seasons: algae and dark streaking, heavier on the shaded elevations and wherever irrigation had been hitting the wall. That is living growth rather than dirt, which is why it gets soft washed rather than blasted.
The driveway was a different story. On top of the usual ground-in dirt and algae in the joints there was a real amount of loose debris and rubbish sitting on the stone. None of that comes off with a pressure washer. Run a surface cleaner over it and you turn it into a slurry, push it into the joints and spend longer digging it back out than you saved.
So the job was sequenced rather than just booked: clear, then walls, then driveway, then rinse and clear down. Doing it the other way round means washing the driveway twice.
How we sequenced it
Two methods on one visit. Low pressure and the correct treatment on the render, a surface cleaner on the driveway. The walls come first so their run-off lands on paving we have not cleaned yet.
Clear the driveway by hand first
All the loose debris and rubbish off the stone before any machine came out. This was the least interesting part of the day and the part that decided whether the rest of it worked.
Protect what is around it
Planting wetted down and covered where needed, drains and edges considered, and a plan for where the dirty water was going to run before we started rather than after.
Walls soft-washed at low pressure
Applied evenly across each elevation rather than spot-treating the worst patches, because patch-treating leaves you with clean rectangles on a dirty wall. Low pressure so nothing is driven in behind the render.
Then the driveway, with the surface cleaner
Overlapping, controlled passes across the whole area so the finish is even. Stripes and tiger marks are the signature of a rushed job and they are very hard to correct afterwards.
Joints handled with a lighter touch
Sanded and filled joints get less pressure so the fill stays where it belongs, and anything that needs topping up afterwards gets pointed out rather than left to show up in the next downpour.
Rinsed and cleared down, not left to dry back
Everything we lifted off the walls and the driveway gets rinsed away and the residue cleared, instead of settling back onto the surface we had just finished.
The result
“Did a fantastic job pressure washing and cleaning my driveway and patio. The dirt had been building up for years, and it was such a relief to finally get it gone. The guys did a really good job.”
Common questions
Why soft wash the walls instead of pressure washing them?
Because what is on the wall is living growth, not dirt. A pressure washer knocks the top off it and leaves the roots, so it is back within months. On render it can also force water in behind the coating and leave permanent banding where the passes overlapped. Soft washing is slower on the day and lasts far longer.
Why do the walls before the driveway?
Because gravity. Whatever comes off an elevation runs down onto the paving underneath it. Clean the driveway first and you will be cleaning it again after the walls. It is a small piece of sequencing that saves a lot of time and looks obvious once you have done it the wrong way once.
Do you clear rubbish and debris off the driveway, or should I?
We will do it. On this job it was a decent amount and it all came off by hand before the machine came out. If there is a lot, mention it at the survey so it is in the fixed price rather than a surprise on the day.
Will pressure washing damage the driveway stone or the joints?
Not when the pressure and the technique match the surface, which is exactly why we want to see it before quoting. The real risk on filled and sanded joints is washing the fill out, and that is a technique problem rather than an unavoidable one.
How long until the walls look clean?
Some of the change is visible on the day and the rest develops over the following days as the growth dies back. If you are expecting an instant pressure-washer reveal on render, soft washing does not work like that, and that is rather the point of using it.
Do you cover Vale do Lobo?
Yes. Vale do Lobo is inside our core round along with Quinta do Lago, Vilamoura, Almancil, Loulé and Quarteira, so it is a local job for us rather than a trip.
