Rooflights and skylights for Eltham homes
Eltham was built up in layers: Archibald Cameron Corbett's suburban streets of 1900 to 1914, the Progress Estate of 1915, then the Page, Middle Park and Horn Park estates. A landing, a bathroom or a loft room with no window of its own can be lit from the roof.
- Free survey, fixed written quote
- 10-year workmanship guarantee
Dark corners inside an Eltham house
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1 The landing at the head of the stairs Houses of the early twentieth century were often planned around a central stair, with a bedroom at each end and no outside wall touching the landing. It borrows whatever light slips out of open bedroom doors. -
2 The bathroom with one small pane A bathroom is usually the smallest room in the house, and frosted glass lets in less than clear glass. A roof window or sun tunnel gives it daylight without touching the walls. -
3 The loft room under one slope Once a loft has been boarded and lined, the roof slope is the only surface left for glass. A window there lights the room and gives it an opening sash for air.
Corbett's streets and the estates after
A house here can date from almost any decade of the twentieth century.
Edward the Third held a Parliament at Eltham in 1329, and again in 1375. The village streets beside the Palace, and the land around them, stayed rural until Archibald Cameron Corbett bought the Eltham Park Estate and built well-made suburban housing on it between 1900 and 1914. Four large estates were standing by the start of the Second World War: the Progress Estate (1915), the Page Estate (1923), Middle Park (1931 to 1936) and Horn Park, begun in 1936 and completed in the 1950s. After the First World War the building of estates continued unabated, and the small council estates of Pippenhall and Strongbow Crescent were completed about 1960. Which decade a house comes from sets what we expect to find in its loft.
The landing
Suburban houses of the early and interwar decades were often arranged around one central stair. Bedrooms take the front and back walls, the bathroom takes a corner, and the landing is left in the middle with no outside wall. By day it gets light from a bedroom only if someone leaves a door ajar. Glass in the slope above the stairwell lights it for good, provided the loft leaves room for a shaft from rafters down to ceiling. The shaft is usually splayed at its sides so the light spreads across the landing instead of dropping in a narrow column. A tight loft, with a water tank or a boarded floor in the way, can rule the shaft out; a sun tunnel then takes a narrower route to the same ceiling. A lit landing also spills some of its daylight down the staircase to the hall. The loft hatch above the landing gives a first view of the roof space before any measuring starts.
Horn Park shows how much one estate can vary, since it was begun in 1936 and not completed until the 1950s. Houses on the same estate may differ in age, roof pitch and loft space. We therefore survey the roof above the landing in front of us and do not assume it matches next door.
The bathroom
Bathrooms are often given a small window, frosted for privacy, set where the plumbing allowed. Glass in the roof above the bath or basin brings in daylight from overhead, where nothing needs frosting, and a sash that opens lets steam out. A bathroom is damp every day, so the glazing and the way the room is ventilated are chosen together at survey. If the layout leaves no room for a window, the alternative is a sun tunnel for a bathroom, and our costs page lists what goes into a figure.
A house of any of these ages may have been altered since it was built. A flat-roofed addition over a back door, a garage turned into a utility space, a porch closed in: each leaves a room behind it without its old window. Over a flat roof the answer is often a flat roof rooflight, set over the room that lost its glass, while a pitched roof over the same spot gets a window set into its slope. The room behind it gets the daylight it lost when the extension went up.
What moves the price of a stair-top or bathroom job
- Roof coveringTiles, slates and flat roofs each need their own flashing and their own labour.
- Product chosenRoof windows, sun tunnels and flat rooflights come in different frame sizes and fit different openings.
- Ceiling to roof distanceThe gap between the two sets the length of a light well or tunnel.
- Reaching the roofWhether a ladder is enough or the roof needs scaffold.
- Finish insidePlaster, lining and paint to match the ceiling around the opening.
Loft rooms and the paperwork behind them
A loft room with a single gable window is lit from one end only, and a boarded attic under a long slope can feel like a cupboard with a bed in it. Setting a window into the slope sends daylight to the place where the desk or the bed stands. The sloping ceiling picks up the daylight and passes it down to the floor. People sleep and work in a loft room, so more rules apply to it than to a landing: how the stairs run, how the room is left in an emergency, and what the structure under the slope allows. Escape and energy standards are set out in the guide to Building Regulations for skylights. Where the loft is already a room, the stairs and the height of the house are measured at survey.
Height matters in a loft. A person standing at the edge of a sloping ceiling meets the glass at a different level from one sitting up in bed, so the position of the window up the slope is fixed with the furniture in mind. We sketch the room with you at survey and mark where the bed, desk or storage will go before the opening is set out.
Before a date goes in the diary
- Name the dark space Send the address and say whether it is the landing, the bathroom or a loft room.
- Measure the structure Covering, rafters and the gap to the ceiling decide which product fits.
- Check the address Conservation, listing and planning history are checked with Greenwich.
- Price the job Product, opening, glazing and finish are priced together on one sheet.
If the room already has a roof window, the size marked on its frame lets us plan a like-for-like swap or pick a second window to sit beside it. A second window in the same slope can light the far end of a long loft room.
Under the slope sit the rafters. Where an opening is wider than the gap between two of them, the rafters around it are trimmed and a framed header takes their load. We work out that framing at survey from what is visible in the loft, and it goes into the quote. Insulation in the rafters or on the loft floor changes how deep the light well has to be, and it is measured at the same visit.
Which council decides
For a house in Eltham, the planning authority is the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The type of house and its planning history decide whether you need to apply. Our planning permission guide lists the conditions that apply. Once we have seen the roof we run them against your address.
Eltham Palace and listed buildings
There is a conservation area named for Eltham Palace, and other designations sit close by. Our conservation area rooflight guide explains how that bears on a rooflight. Listing is the larger hurdle. The Royal Blackheath Golf Club dates back to Tudor times, and its clubhouse, Eltham Lodge, is a grade I listed building, and a new or altered roof window on a listed house will almost always need listed building consent. We look up your street in the council's own records before quoting for any roof near either.
Reaching Eltham from the Maidstone base
From our base in Maidstone, Eltham lies about 28 miles to the north-west, which puts it inside the 30 miles we cover. The survey takes in the whole roof, so you can ask about any other dim room on the same visit.
On the day, the loft hatch and the stairs are the route for every tool, so the landing carpet and the banisters are covered before anything is carried up. If the work runs over, we agree with you how the open roof is protected overnight.
Roof words, defined
- Roof window
- Glazing fitted flush with the roof slope, level with the tiles or slates around it.
- Rooflight
- A glazed unit sitting on a kerb or upstand, out of plane with the roof surface.
- Sun tunnel
- A tube lined to reflect light, running from a rooftop dome to a diffuser fitted in the ceiling.
- Light well
- The lined shaft that runs from the glass in the roof down to the finished ceiling. The sides are often splayed so the light spreads.
- Building control approver
- A registered body that can sign off notifiable building work, alongside the council's own team.
On a small estate such as Pippenhall or Strongbow Crescent, a survey starts with the roof covering and with whatever has been added to the house since it went up. On the larger interwar estates the first question is where the stairs sit in relation to the loft hatch. Flat-roofed garages and porches added since the house was built are surveyed at the same visit.
A job in the roof of a terraced or semi-detached house also affects the neighbours, even if only for a day, so we agree access and working hours with you beforehand and tell you what noise to expect while the opening is formed. Parking for the van is the other practical point on built-up estate streets, so mention any permits or restrictions outside the house.
Once the work is complete you receive the paperwork, plus a 10-year workmanship guarantee in writing. To book, send a WhatsApp message to 07880 284133, drop a line to info@orchardskylightsmaidstone.co.uk, or complete the quote form further down.
We also cover Sidcup, Bexleyheath and Bromley.
Landings, bathrooms and Eltham's listed buildings
Who pays for the survey if we decide not to go ahead?
Nobody does. The visit is free for an Eltham address as for any other, and a figure only follows once the roof has been seen and measured.
Our landing has no window at all. Roof window or sun tunnel?
The loft decides. A roof window needs room for a light well between rafters and ceiling, while a sun tunnel makes do with a narrower route.
We live near Eltham Palace. Does that stop a roof window?
A conservation area alone does not remove the permitted development rights; only an Article 4 direction does. We check the address against the council's records.
Who deals with planning for an Eltham rooflight?
The Royal Borough of Greenwich is the local planning authority. The harder part is telling if an application is needed in the first place, and the planning guide works through that question.
What goes into a bathroom with a sloping ceiling and no window?
Glazing in the slope lets daylight in and, with an opening sash, lets damp air out. If the angle or layout rules that out, a sun tunnel can carry light from a dome higher up the roof. A bathroom under the slope can take the glass directly above the bath or the basin.
Our loft room is already a bedroom. Is a new roof window building work?
The structure and energy performance of a new roof opening are checked as building work, and escape routes too where a loft room is involved. We handle the Building Control notification where the work is notifiable.
Nearby towns to Eltham
Book your free survey
Tell us about the room that stays dark. We come out, look at the room and the roof, then send a fixed written quote.
Or on 07880 284133, or call 01622 277162
No obligation. We survey before we price.