Masonry (albañilería) covers the building work between strip-out and finishes: new or relocated partitions in brick or plasterboard, door openings, plastering, chases for pipes and cables, corner beads, suspended ceilings and built-in niches. We carry it out as part of a coordinated renovation. Load-bearing walls are outside this scope and need an architect’s assessment first.
What does masonry work include in a Spanish renovation?
In Spain, albañil is the trade that ties a renovation together. Beyond laying bricks, the albañil prepares the surfaces every other trade relies on. On our jobs, the masonry stage typically includes:
- Partitions: building new internal walls in ceramic brick or block, or in plasterboard on a metal frame.
- Openings: forming or widening doorways in non-structural walls, with proper lintels.
- Chasing: cutting channels for pipes and cables so the installers can work, then filling them.
- Plastering: applying plaster by hand or machine, with corner beads for crisp edges.
- Screeds: levelling floors before new tiles or timber.
- Ceilings and niches: suspended plasterboard ceilings, coves for indirect lighting, shower niches and shelving.
Brick or plasterboard: which suits which wall?
Both have a place, and the choice should follow the room rather than habit. Brick is robust, takes heavy fixings without special anchors and is the traditional backing for tiled wet rooms. It is slower, wetter and heavier. Plasterboard on a metal frame is lighter, quicker and gives very straight surfaces; it is ideal for dividing living spaces, boxing in services and building storage into a wall. In bathrooms, moisture-resistant board with the right waterproofing works well.
Acoustics matter in apartment blocks. A plasterboard partition with insulation in the cavity can perform well, but the detail at the floor and ceiling junctions makes as much difference as the board itself. If you are reconfiguring an older apartment, the specialist site reformapisosmalaga.eu goes deeper into layout changes in flats.
Can any wall be removed to open up the space?
No, and this is the question to settle before anything else. Many Costa del Sol apartment blocks are built with a concrete frame of columns and beams, so most internal walls are partitions that can be moved. But some walls carry load, some contain shared services, and in older houses the internal walls are frequently structural.
We remove and build non-load-bearing partitions. If there is any doubt about whether a wall is structural, or if the plan involves cutting a beam, enlarging an opening in a load-bearing wall or removing a column, that needs an architect or aparejador and, as a rule, a licence rather than a simple notification. We tell you that plainly at the first visit. Our guide on what a renovation will not fix explains where a technician has to come in.
Why does the masonry stage decide the quality of the finish?
Large-format porcelain tiles show every bump in the wall behind them. A shower with a linear drain only works if the floor falls in the right direction. A painted wall under raking light reveals every patch. All of this is decided during masonry, not during tiling or painting.
That is why we check walls and floors with a level before the finishing trades arrive, and why masonry is never rushed to make up time. A wall that is out of plumb costs little to correct while it is bare plaster and a great deal once it is tiled. The full order of trades, and why each one waits for the previous, is covered in our renovation sequence guide.
How do masonry and the services work together?
The installers and the albañil work in a loop. Partitions go up, the plumber and the authorised partner electrician mark and run their routes, the albañil closes the chases, and only then is the wall plastered. In ceilings, the frame goes up, cables and any ducts are placed, and then the boards close.
Getting this loop right avoids the classic problem of a new wall being opened a few days later because a socket or a pipe was forgotten. We walk through the positions of sockets, switches, lights and taps with you before the chasing starts, so the services go exactly where the furniture and fittings will need them.
What can you see of this stage in our project photos?
Most renovation galleries show only finished rooms. Ours deliberately includes the stage in between, because it is where quality is decided. In the gallery you will find brick partitions going up to form a new layout, door openings framed in new brickwork, corridors with fresh chases for services, walls plastered by machine with steel props still in place, and corners finished with metal beads.
You will also see the ceiling work: metal framing suspended over a newly plastered room, boards lifted into place with a board lifter, and open-plan spaces with a continuous ceiling before painting. None of it is glamorous, and that is the point. When you look at a builder’s portfolio, ask to see this stage. A contractor who is proud of their masonry is usually careful about everything that sits on top of it. Our projects page groups the same photos by type of work.
Is masonry offered as a stand-alone job?
We carry out masonry as part of a coordinated renovation — a full renovation, a partial renovation or a reconfiguration of part of a home — because that is where planning the stages together adds value. Typical examples are opening a kitchen to the living area, turning one large bedroom into two, or building a dressing area with integrated storage.
If your project is mainly about stripping out a property or demolishing internal walls with no renovation afterwards, that is a different job, covered by our sister site on interior demolition in Málaga.
Bauman Raymond Attila · Reformas Integrales Málaga · Avenida Antonio Belón 3, Marbella. Last reviewed: 05/11/2026.
