Assessing their work

A further advantage of attending a DIY course is that, while it may not immediately equip you to do everything yourself, it will put you in a better position to deal with the experts you all in and to question their decisions if you’re not happy with their work. The more householders learn about DIY, in theory and practice, the harder it’s going to be for those ‘cowboy’ professionals to get away with shoddy workmanship and throwaway answers, thus raising standards in the whole industry.

There’s also no telling where an introductory DIY course can take your own professional life. Tracey Bennett tells of a young woman who attended a tiling course for tiling jobs around her own home. “During the course she was given a table to open up her mind creatively, to design and tile the table using mosaics,” she says. “She enjoyed the experience so much she now tiles tables in mosaic designs for a living.”

Women Builders offer courses at both basic and advanced levels – the latter for those wanting to work in trades. They, too, have had instances of students coming to the basic course with no knowledge of DIY who were inspired to work in the trade and have since qualified as professionals.

Online assistance

Once you’re feeling confident enough to start using DIY tools, there’s a wealth of information and guidance on the Internet. DIY retailers such as B&Q, Focus DIY and Homebase all offer detailed advice on their websites, with step-by-step illustrated leaflets you can download on a range of projects. Similarly, the BBC Homes website offers “step-by-step guides from your favourite experts”, such as the teams from Changing Rooms or DIY SOS.

The DIY Doctor website, which attracts 50,000 users per week, takes DIY guidance a step further by offering free assistance “from qualified tradesmen through an interactive question and answer service”. If their project guides don’t give you the answers you’re looking for, you can submit your question through the ‘Appointments and Suggestions’ page and a tradesman emails you back a response.

While many of these online projects are for the more experienced DIY hand, they’re a valuable source of education, providing a clear idea of what skills, tools and materials different tasks involve. It’s worth bearing in mind that they assume a certain level of know-how: they’ll tell you when to use a certain tool for a certain step, but you’ll need to be familiar with how to use that tool in the first place.

Ready for anything

Janet Shelley, the former schoolgirl discouraged from woodwork classes who now runs her own building company, believes that all women lack when it comes to DIY is confidence. Indeed women have attributes that make for a better DIY practitioner: they are more willing to follow diagrams and instructions, and less likely to take a saw to something if they believe it doesn’t fit. “Women are a little more focused [than men],” she adds. “They know when to stop – when to have a cup of tea and get back to it.” The way forward, as Janet sees it? “Get women to make other women more confident. Once they’ve got that, they can do anything.”  

A DIY essential task to get you started – repairing a dripping tap

From B&Q You Can Do It – the complete B&Q step-by-step book of home improvement, £16.95.

Tools:
Adjustable spanner or pliers;
Screwdriver;
Pipe wrench;
Cloth.

Materials:
Tap washer;
Silicone grease;
Cardboard.

Don’t ignore a dripping tap! The sooner you tackle it, the easier it will be to fix and the less damage will be done. Even if you don’t have a spare washer, take a look inside the tap – if the washer is only slightly damaged on one face, you can reinsert it the other way up. But even if that stops the drip, do remember to replace it with a new washer as soon as possible.

Standard mixer taps can be repaired as shown here, but monobloc taps – often controlled by levers, and needing only a quarter turn between fully off and fully on – have ceramic disks rather than traditional washers. The disks are very hardwearing, but if one does develop a problem you will need a replacement cartridge from the tap manufacturer.

1. Turn off the water supply and open the tap to drain water from the system. Put the plug into the plug-hole, just in case you drop any small nuts or screws. Unscrew the top plate (this has the hot/cold emblem on it). You might be able to do this with your fingers, but if not, use pliers or an adjustable spanner.