How To Insulate A Single Brick Wall

  • Read our guide on insulating your home.
  • Find out how to insulate a single brick wall in your home.
insulate a brick wall

Adding insulation to your home can seem daunting but having the correct insulation will ensure that you can save on your energy bills.

Insultation and your home

The goal of insulation is to create an airtight layer between the environment around your home and the occupied space within your home.

Homes that were built before the 20th century had the benefit of having external or internal wall insulation because the walls of the house were made from solid stone or brick.

It is more common now for homes to have internal wall insulation because internal wall insultation is cheaper, but for insulating a single brick wall that exists as part of the external walls of your home, it wouldn’t be too much trouble to have external insulation, instead.

However, you should take into account the kind of look you want to achieve with your home. If you don’t mind covering up the external walls, then external wall insulation is fine. But if you have a brick home, it’s better to go with internal wall insulation so you aren’t covering anything up.

how to insulate a wall
A worker adding an insulating board in front of fresh brickwork during the insulation process.

Internal wall insulation

Internal wall insulation uses insulative materials and attaches them to the interior walls of your home. For this kind of insulation, homeowners should remember that they would only need to insulate the walls of their home that do not meet the homes of their neighbours.

For example, a terraced property would require less internal insulation than a detached property because the walls that connect properties to each other would not need to be insulated.

It’s fairly easy to insulate the internal walls of your home, too. There’s no need to cause disruption throughout your home while insulating because internal wall insulation only requires access to one wall at a time.

You can work through your home rather than sacrificing your space during the insulation process.

It’s best to insulate your home in this way during the decorating process. Once the plasterboard is in place, there’s no way to complete internal wall insulation without taking the plasterboard back out – which would cause more work than you’re probably looking for.

Internal wall insulation issues

There are few issues when it comes to internal wall insulation.

The most common issue that homeowners have is the loss of space that happens when you add insulation to your internal walls. For smaller properties, it can feel like you’re losing valuable space that you paid for when you purchased the property.

This is especially annoying with small and expensive homes, such as those brought in central London.

No matter what you do, if you’re committing to internal wall insulation, you will need to come to terms with the loss of space.

Unlike insulation that is external, there is a limit to the amount of insulation you can add internally.

As a final issue, there’s the constraint of when you can put your insulation in. Insulation can only be added before the plasterboard is put up. If you’re adding insulation later on in your house’s life, you will have to break down the plaster to insulate, and then re-plasterboard the entire wall.

Benefits of internal wall insulation

Now, let’s look at the benefits rather than the cons.

Internal wall insulation will allow you to keep the overall look of your home without covering up any of its features. Sure, you’ll lose a few centimetres in each room, but this is the perfect type of insulation from houses with brick, stone, slate etc. on their outer walls.

Additionally, internal wall insulation is cheaper than external wall insulation. It’s also more convenient because it can be done during the decorating process, so you’ll know that you have a warm home from the start. Energy savings are a huge benefit with this type of insulation.

insulate a single brick wall
A cross-section of thermal insulation between two brick walls, showing the layers of insulation.

A brief look at external wall insulation

To insulate walls externally, you would need to add insulation boards to the walls from the outside of your home.

Typically, you would use PIR boards to complete your external wall insulation. This kind of insulation also assists with keeping your energy costs low, but it does cover up the outside walls of your home. This could be a positive or a negative, depending on the look you’re going for.

If all of your external walls are insulated, you could be looking at a saving of 35% on your energy, but we aren’t here to discuss insulating all of your walls, just a single wall.

Using external insulation on a single wall may not seem like it will do much, but the affects of external insulation can be extremely beneficial.

Think about it this way: While internal wall insulation adds insulation between the inner and outer walls of your home, external wall insulation creates a barrier to exist directly between the environment and your home’s external walls.

Insulating your single brick wall

As you’re looking to insulation a single brick wall, you can use either insulation type to achieve a good, energy-saving effect.

Homes with brickwork are more likely to use internal wall insulation on a single brick wall by inserting the insulation between the brick and plasterboard layer of that wall. You’ll need a stud wall and some insulation roll or a similar product. Alternatively, you can use insulated plasterboard!

This way, you won’t cover up your brickwork, and you can insulate your home as you continue along your decorating process.

If you’d prefer to use external wall insulation, you’ll need to fit a starter track and install insulation boards onto the outside of your home where that single brick wall is. There’s a lot more work involved with external wall insulation, thanks to the fixings, reinforcement, and mesh needed.

© 2022 renovated.co.uk. All Rights Reserved.