Skylights and rooflights in Sidcup

The 1930s semi and its side room

A 1930s semi often has a hipped roof, a hall running past the front room and a kitchen at the back. Over the years the space beside the kitchen is the part that gets built on: a utility room, a downstairs shower or a boot room that fills the gap to the boundary. Put one against the neighbour's flank wall and the room has a door and nothing else. A washing machine does not mind. A room where someone folds laundry for an hour feels like a cupboard without daylight.

The roof over a side addition is often a low lean-to or a flat section tied into the main slope. Either gives somewhere to set a unit: a small flat rooflight, or a pitched-roof window if the lean-to is sloped. The back bedroom of the same house may be a narrow room with one window, and a second opening in the slope above can lighten the far end without touching the garden elevation.

The larger Victorian and Edwardian houses

Older and larger houses ask a different question. With a stair hall at the centre and tall rooms around it, daylight reaches the front and back rooms and drops away in between. The landing under the main roof can be a long way from a window, and an attic floor above it may have been added as bedrooms or a study. A window in the main slope above the stair brings daylight down the full height of the house. On a pitched slate or tile roof we look at the rafters, the insulation and the loft floor before we say what will fit.

Not every opening is a roof window. A sun tunnel carries daylight from a small unit on the roof to a diffuser in the ceiling, and it suits a utility room or a bathroom where the loft lies between the room and the roof. A flat rooflight, set on a kerb, suits a flat-roofed extension. We run through each one at the survey for the specific roof over the room that bothers you.

Ceiling height changes the answer as well. The tall rooms of an Edwardian house let light from a roof window fall a long way before it fades, while a low 1930s utility room under a flat roof gets its light in one short, bright patch on the floor. A unit with a splayed lining, where the sides of the shaft angle outwards, spreads that patch across more of the ceiling.

Roof shapes on a suburban street

Hipped roofs, gabled roofs and flat-roofed extensions can sit side by side on one house. A hip slopes away on three sides and leaves less plain slope for a window than a gable does, so the unit goes where a run of clear rafters allows. A gable-ended side addition, by contrast, gives a long clean slope to work with.

A tall Edwardian stair often has a deep well, and a long shaft throws less light to the bottom than a short one. A wider lining at the ceiling end helps, and the depth of the loft above the stairs sets how much of that can be done.

The back of a house is often the better side for glass, since it faces the garden and leaves the street view as it is. Where there is a bay window at the front, it already takes light from the street side, which is another reason to look at the rear slope first.

If your street is in one of those areas

Your address gets checked against the council's own records before we tell you anything. A flat, low-profile conservation rooflight sits closer to the slates or tiles than a standard dome does, which counts for more once an application is in. Our conservation area rooflight guide walks through the choices.

Flats and converted houses

Large Victorian and Edwardian houses are sometimes divided into flats. Householder permitted development does not reach a flat or a maisonette, so a roof window over the top flat's bedroom needs permission from Bexley unless the council tells you otherwise. A house made from a former office, shop or barn through a change-of-use conversion has no such rights either. The planning guide for skylights covers houses, and if your home is in a block or a converted building, bring the lease or title to the survey so we can see who owns the roof.

Building work behind the opening

A new opening in the roof is building work in the legal sense, and that brings in the structure, the energy standard and sometimes fire and escape. A new or replacement roof window must meet 1.4 W/m²K (or Window Energy Rating band B) and a rooflight 2.2 W/m²K under Part L, as the Building Regulations guide lays out. A loft room on a two-storey house is where escape matters: the new storey sits more than 4.5 m up, so it normally needs a protected escape route down the stairs.

If a back bedroom under the main roof is a habitable loft, a roof window above the bed lets in daylight and air, and escape is dealt with in our Building Regulations guide.

Starting in the dark room

Every decision on the job is made during a free survey. We stand in the utility room, the stairwell or the back bedroom that made you call, check where the existing windows point and where their daylight gives out, and then go up to the roof. On a hipped tiled roof the covering, the spacing of the rafters and what is in the loft all get checked. On a flat or lean-to section we check the deck, the fall and the way it meets the main wall.

The written quote itemises the unit and its size, what goes on the roof and what is done to the ceiling and walls inside, all under a single total. Once the job is finished, the paperwork includes our 10-year workmanship guarantee.

A different product for each dark room

A single visit can end with three different units for three rooms in the same house, because each room has its own roof above it. The utility room, the back bedroom and the stairwell can each sit under a different part of the roof. Every floor of the house can see the light from a stairwell unit, and a pale finish on the stair wall carries it down the flight.

We line the shaft between the roof and the ceiling, plaster the reveals and leave the room ready to paint. Where a window sits over a bed or a desk, we also check where the handle falls and whether the sash can be reached from where you sit. On a stair, that lining can be angled to push light down the flight.

Neighbouring towns

Nearby are Bexley and Bexleyheath to the north-east, and Eltham to the north-west. A Sidcup visit can be booked through WhatsApp on 07880 284133, an email to info@orchardskylightsmaidstone.co.uk, or through the form lower down.