James Roberts

The work picked up in the foundations and I jumped back on with my previous company. I worked here for 3 months then had to leave as I was going travelling in Asia

When the foundation work was wearing thin in England as they were no longer digging new builds, I went on to do superstructure building the entire house. As this was what I started my career doing, it didn’t take long to pick up where I left off. Days consisted of building corners, running to a line and then jumping inside and building the internal blockwork. I worked with 2 other bricklayers and 1 labourer. It was vital I acted in a safe manner as this work was on scaffold so a lot higher up than the foundations I was on previously.

Working for this company allowed me to learn the fundamentals of bricklaying. Further advancing my skills. It wasn’t just all aspects of bricklaying I learnt but also how to work with a team. Eventually I got given my own jobs and was left alone to apply everything I had learnt. I primarily built the foundations for houses, which including blockwork, internals and up to 6 courses of splash brickwork. But we also did big retaining walls.

It was my job to keep the site clean, tidy and safe. Making sure all trades were happy. This was not my only role on site as I also got taught how to lay bricks and blocks on bespoke multi million pound homes which included detailed feature work.