Mixed kitchen and bathroom floors in Newham terraces
Latex screed is the name flooring trades use for a levelling compound that arrives in two parts. One is a dry, cement based powder. The other is a latex liquid that takes the place of the water you would normally add. Once cured, the layer keeps a slight flexibility and holds onto smooth or difficult surfaces better than a standard mix, which is why it gets chosen when the base is anything other than plain, clean concrete.
Lift the lino in an older Newham kitchen and the floor below is rarely one material. A strip of quarry tiles by the back door, a patch of concrete where a wall once stood and boards in the next room is a common mix in houses of that age. Latex can tie those surfaces together, but only if each one is sound. Tiles must be fixed tight, with none rocking or sounding hollow when tapped, and they are degreased and primed before any mixing starts. Concrete is checked for dust and loose residue.
Timber needs more care. Bare floorboards never take latex directly, because they shrink and swell through the year and a thin cement layer cracks along every joint. A carpenter first screws flooring grade plywood down over the boards, and the latex is spread across that stiff deck.
The finishes that need this are the thin, flexible ones. Sheet vinyl, safety flooring and LVT all show every bump through their surface. For flatness classes and general compound work, our floor levelling page for Newham explains how flat each finish needs the base to be.
Checking a Newham floor before latex goes down
A layer a few millimetres thick is only as good as whatever lies under it, so the floor is tested before anything is mixed. Three findings stop a latex job in its tracks.
Damp comes first. In the older terraced streets, floors were often laid with no damp proof membrane, and latex does nothing to hold back moisture rising through a slab. Where a meter shows the base is wet, the floor needs a membrane and a new build up, and a rebuilt sand and cement floor may be the honest fix.
Movement is the second. If plywood or boards flex underfoot, the latex will crack above them. Extra fixings, thicker ply or repairs to the joists sort that out, and a carpenter does them before we return.
The third is a room that sits well out of level. Latex smooths a surface; it does not lift a sagging room by several centimetres. Where one side of a room stands well above the other, the high spots may need diamond grinding by our own team, with the low areas built up in screed afterwards.
Priming closes the checklist. Each base gets the primer its maker names, and a calcium sulphate screed, if a flat has one, is sanded free of laitance and always primed before latex touches it.
How we price latex screed in Newham
A fixed written price within 24 hours, once we know the area and the base. See our floor screeding cost guide.
Who lays your latex screed in Newham
K & B Screeding’s own team, led by director Donatas Bardisevicius. Founded 2019, company 12298780.
See what customers say in our Google reviews and on our testimonials page.
Latex Screed from Slough to Newham
Newham is about 29.3 miles east of our Slough base as the crow flies, with postcodes including E6, E16, E7 and E12. The nearest towns to it are Tower Hamlets (3.2 miles), Greenwich (3.7 miles), Barking and Dagenham (4 miles) and Redbridge (4.1 miles).
More on latex screed, part of our screeding services.
