Roof Repairs & Restoration Toorak

Toorak House went up in 1849, and by the 1880s land boom the streets around it were filling with mansions in spacious gardens. Since 2021 we've carried out 16 roof repairs and 4 full roof restorations in Toorak, as at September 2026.

Between the wars came the flats, and building them carried on into the 1950s and 60s. So a Toorak roof might belong to a Victorian mansion, a 1930s block of flats or a period home, and each needs a different approach.

The streets are wide and planted with oaks and oriental planes, which is lovely until autumn, when gutters and valleys fill with leaves and water backs up under the tiles.

Across mansions, flats and period homes, these are the faults that let water in:

• Cracked Marseilles terracotta tiles, often from branches or a careless foot

• Ridge and hip mortar that has broken up, loosening the caps along long hipped roofs

• Leaves from oaks and plane trees packing valleys and gutters every autumn

• Rusted valley irons, and flashings failing around chimneys and dormers

• Parapets on flats and shops hiding roofs that nobody has checked in years

• Water getting in where later additions meet the original roof

Most of these are repair jobs, which is the bulk of what I do in Toorak. Fixed properly, they keep a grand old roof going for years.

Some Toorak homes have slate roofs. The houses of St Georges Court, for example, were built with roofs of slate or Marseilles tiles. Slate is a specialist trade and I don't take it on, so if yours is slate I'll tell you on the spot and point you to a slater.

Marseilles terracotta, concrete tile and iron are my trade. On those I re-bed and re-point ridges, replace cracked tiles, fix valleys and flashings, and restore the whole roof when it needs it.

Many Toorak homes are in a Heritage Overlay, and the same state-wide rules apply as in Malvern. I have set them out on my Malvern page: in short, a roof that has never been painted needs a permit before it is coated, while like-for-like repairs generally do not. Check your address on VicPlan first.

Toorak gained a lot of flats between the wars and through the 1950s and 60s. Their roofs are easy to forget about, because nobody lives up there and the gutters are often out of sight, until a top-floor ceiling stains.

In most blocks the roof is common property, so the owners corporation arranges and pays for the work. An inspection with photos gives the committee something concrete to decide on, and I can quote for the whole roof or just the problem area.