Grain skylights and rooflights

Layers of history on a small patch

Grain Fort was built in the 1860s for coastal defence and was used until the 1950s. A railway pier station served a ferry that was withdrawn in 1901; the pier fell into disuse by 1931 and the station moved to a new site just inland. Building the BP facility took from 1948 to 1952, and the North Sea flood of 1953 breached the sea wall almost at once. The oil-fired power station came down in 2015, and a gas-fired one now stands on the site. A place with this much working history is not made of one kind of house, and we check what is under your tiles before assuming anything.

What an exposed site changes

A house near open water can take more wind than one inland. For a rooflight, that bears on the fixings, the flashing and the finish we specify, and we settle those at the survey with your roof in front of us. It also bears on use afterwards: an opening vent is one more thing to think about on a blustery site, and on a plain fixed unit there is nothing to rattle.

Exposure does not change the reason a room is dark. A deep room sits far from its window wherever the house stands, and a landing with walls on all sides stays dim whatever the weather outside. The survey separates the two questions: first where the daylight is missing, then what the roof and the site ask of the unit that supplies it.

Wide skies and shallow pitches

A low roof under a big sky tempts people to think the house must be bright. Daylight comes in through glass, and glass sits in walls, so a house can be full of sky outside and still have a back room that never sees it. Shallow pitches add something to think about: a roof window needs a minimum slope to shed water, and a very low pitch can push you towards a flat rooflight or a different flashing kit instead. Both routes are workable, and the survey establishes which one your roof calls for.

What the survey looks at on a site like this

We go into the loft, if there is one, and look at the underside of the covering, the timbers and what runs across them. Where the roof is flat, we look at the build-up, because the thickness of insulation and decking sets the height of the kerb. Outside, we note the pitch, the direction the slope faces and what stands near it. Then we come down and talk through the options with the dark room in view.

The utility room

A utility room at the back of a house is typically a narrow space with a door, a washing machine and a worktop. If it was added as a flat-roofed lean-to, its only window may look onto a fence. A small flat rooflight above the worktop gives it daylight at the time of day you use it, and it can have an opening vent where a damp room needs air. Talk to us about the upstand before you buy anything, because the kerb height and the insulation beneath it decide what fits.

Kerbs, upstands and the layers beneath

A flat roof is a stack of layers: structure, insulation, a waterproof covering and sometimes a finish on top. The rooflight kerb has to rise above the covering by enough to stay watertight, and the insulation around it has to be continuous so the opening is not a cold spot. The height of that upstand sets the height the glass reaches over the roof surface, and that is the figure the planning question turns on. For the build-up layer by layer, read upstands and kerbs.

The landing

Stairs and landings can be the dimmest part of a two-storey house. A roof window above the stairwell is the usual answer, and where the loft hatch is in the way we look at a tunnel from the side instead. Over a low pitched roof the light well is short, which keeps the unit close to the ceiling line and makes it simple to finish inside. Where the pitch is shallow, we also check the minimum pitch the chosen unit allows before any order is placed.

A back bedroom under a low roof

Where the ceiling of a bedroom follows a low roof, a window in the slope puts daylight high up the wall, where a side window cannot reach. A short light well passes more light to the floor than a deep one, and a pale, slightly splayed lining helps it spread. Doors with glass panels, left open, pass some of that light on to the landing.

The hallway

A hall with several doors off it has no windows of its own and borrows from the rooms around it when their doors are open. If the hall sits directly beneath the roof space, a sun tunnel brings in a steady wash of light along the ceiling. If it does not, the landing or the front door glass may be the better place to start. The page on fitting a skylight into an existing roof lays out the stages that follow.

The utility room as a test case

Steam, a drying cycle and a door that opens onto the garden make a utility room a good place to learn what you want from a rooflight. If the washing is dried indoors, a vent that opens matters more than the view. If the room doubles as a boot room, a unit above the door end throws light on the floor where people trip. Think about when you use the space most, and tell us at the survey; it changes where on the roof the unit goes and how big it should be. A room used for a quick wash and a room used for an hour of ironing are different briefs, even when they share a floor plan.

Choosing between a window, a rooflight and a tunnel

One house can need all three. A pitched roof over the stairs wants a roof window, a flat-roofed extension at the back wants a rooflight, and a hall under an open loft wants a tunnel. They are different products, with different glazing and flashing, and each carries its own price. Start with the one where you spend the most hours, and add the others when the first has settled in.

After you message us

Tell us the room and send your postcode. We then arrange the free survey. With the roof and the room measured, the quote follows, naming the unit and the ceiling finish and what happens to the roof between the two. On the day, the opening is made, the unit goes in and is weathered, and the ceiling around it is finished. A new opening in a roof is building work, and we handle the Building Control notification where the work is notifiable.

Neighbouring places

We cover Sheerness, a little over two miles south-east, Queenborough, about three miles south-east, and Allhallows, about three miles west. If your house sits somewhere between them, a message with the postcode is enough for us to confirm the visit.

One more point for houses with a flat roof over the back. The same dark room can often be lit in two ways, a flat rooflight now or a larger lantern if the extension is rebuilt, and the survey is the time to decide how far ahead you want to plan.