Most of the 91030 was standing before your grandparents were born, and its chimneys were laid in materials nobody stocks anymore. We clean them, inspect them, and repair them with the patience old brick demands — and looking costs you nothing.
From the damper handle to the crown, and from porch piers to garden walls — one company, our own people on every job.
Infrequent, low-temperature fires are precisely the kind that varnish a flue with tar. A season's worth of oak leaves down an open chimney doesn't help either.
A methodical survey of the whole system with photographs of anything questionable — including the camera-scanned Level 2 report that South Pasadena escrows routinely demand.
When a stack has tilted, separated from the wall, or begun dropping brick onto the roof, patching stops being an option. We take it down to sound courses and build it back the way it was.
Clinker brick and arroyo stone built this town, and both punish shortcuts. Hard modern mortar in a 1912 joint destroys the very material it touches — so we copy the original mix instead.
Under this town's canopy of oaks, an open flue collects a compost heap by November. A screened stainless cap keeps out debris, wildlife and rain — and keeps sparks in.
Moss on a shaded stack is a symptom, not a decoration: it means the masonry never dries. We trace where the water gets in, cure it, and treat the brick so it sheds the next storm.
Plenty of 1920s flues here were never lined at all, and cracked clay tiles leak combustion gases into wall cavities. A stainless liner puts a continuous, sized passage inside the old stack.
The brick tapers holding up your porch roof and the low wall along the sidewalk age the same way the chimney does — and deserve the same materials-first treatment.
Old houses whisper before they shout. Any of these is your cue — and having us look costs exactly nothing.
Felt a decent jolt? Let someone look at the stack before the next fire — quake damage hides above the roofline and inside the flue where you'll never spot it from the garden.
Everything agreed on paper first. The work follows the plan, not the other way round.
Explain what the house is doing. Half the time we can tell you over the phone whether it's urgent, cosmetic, or nothing at all.
An arrival slot that respects your calendar, then a proper top-to-bottom look with a camera where eyes can't reach.
The findings and the pricing in writing, sorted by what genuinely matters. Sleep on it as long as you like.
Floors protected, dust contained, the garden raked of every chip before the truck leaves the kerb.
An itemised written estimate on any repair, rebuild, repointing or cap — no charge, no follow-up pestering, no decision required on the spot. That's the whole arrangement.
(626) 568-4307A sample of the trade — sweeping, rebuilding, repointing and the occasional garden wall.
Based on Pasadena Avenue and rarely more than twenty minutes from the job.
Somewhere else nearby? Ring (626) 568-4307 and ask — the answer is usually yes.
It is. A technician visits, examines the chimney or the brickwork, and leaves you an itemised written price. The visit costs nothing, obliges you to nothing, and nobody will ring you three times a week afterwards. Decide at your own pace.
An annual look, with an actual cleaning only once deposits approach an eighth of an inch. Households in this climate burn modestly, so every second or third winter is a common cleaning rhythm — but skip the yearly check and you'll miss the things that happen without fires: tree debris, moisture, and masonry movement.
They're the fingerprint of Craftsman-era building around Pasadena — over-fired, twisted clinker brick and rounded stone hauled out of the arroyo. Neither can be bought at a yard today. Repairs mean salvaging units, hunting matches, and copying the soft original mortar, because a modern hard mix will crack the historic material around it within a few seasons.
Here, yes — the Raymond Fault passes straight through this stretch of the valley, and unreinforced masonry chimneys are the most quake-fragile part of an older house. Diagonal cracking through the joints, a gap opening at the siding, or displaced brick above the roofline all mean: no fires until someone qualified has looked.
Enormously. The oaks and camphors that make these streets beautiful drop leaves and seed pods straight down open flues, and their shade keeps north-facing masonry damp enough for moss. A screened cap ends the debris problem; moss needs its water source fixed, not just scraping off.
It's a moisture gauge growing on your house. Moss means that masonry never dries out — typically a cracked crown holding water or mortar that's lost its weather face. The trapped dampness dissolves soft historic mortar and pushes brick faces off. Remove it, cure the water entry, then protect the surface with a breathable treatment.
All the time — this is one of the busiest real-estate pockets in the valley. What's wanted is a Level 2 inspection with an internal camera survey; the photographed report is in your inbox within a business day and holds its own in negotiations.
Half our calendar. Porch piers on Craftsman bungalows, front steps, garden and retaining walls, planters, barbecues — identical trade, identical materials discipline. Some weeks the roof never features at all.
Weekdays from seven in the morning until half past seven at night — later than anyone else on this page of Google.
The person answering has been on a roof this week. Describe the problem in your own words and you'll get a working diagnosis before the kettle's boiled.
(626) 568-4307 Tap To CallWeekdays, 7:00 AM – 7:30 PM
Saturday and Sunday off the tools