Hardwood deck and courtyard

The deck wraps three sides of the courtyard and had to finish flush with the existing paving and the threshold at the doors, so the joists were packed to suit rather than the boards being ripped down at the edge. Boards run in two directions off a mitred picture-frame border, which means every cut lands on a joist instead of a packer.

Set-out is done with string lines and spacers before anything is fixed down. On a deck this open the screw pattern is the detail you actually see, so the fixings run in straight lines the full length of the run and the board joins are staggered off a set gap.

There is a flush access hatch cut into the field for the services beneath, framed so it drops in level with the surrounding boards and reads as part of the pattern. The whole deck is oiled, and the turf and planting were reinstated up to the edge once the timber was finished.