Rooflight and skylight installation in Maldon

The High Street

A substantial conservation area with a great deal of listed stock, timber framed and Georgian. Front slopes are prominent and any rooflight there is a planning conversation; rear slopes are usually far easier.

Flush conservation rooflights on anything visible, consent first on listed buildings.

The hill

Maldon’s topography means roofs are visible from below and across the estuary in a way flat-country roofs are not. A unit that would be invisible in a valley village is prominent here, which affects both the planning view and the product choice.

Estuary exposure

Salt is present, particularly down towards the Hythe. Marine grade coatings are worth taking near the water.

Modern housing

Inland from the old town the stock is ordinary: trussed roofs, profiled tiles, rear extensions with flat roof rooflights.

Skylight and rooflight work we cover in Maldon

Roof lanterns, flat roof rooflights, roof windows, VELUX replacements, conservation units and sun tunnels, all surveyed before they are quoted. We also work in Heybridge, Tollesbury and Danbury.

A hill town above the Blackwater

Maldon is built on a ridge above the estuary, with a long historic High Street, the quay at Hythe below it, and twentieth century housing spreading inland. The centre carries a large conservation area and a high concentration of listed buildings, some of them medieval behind later frontages.

The hill matters practically. Roofs here are seen from below, from across the estuary and from the streets above, so a rear slope that would be invisible in a flat town is frequently in full view. Any application should describe that honestly rather than leaving the officer to discover it.

Sun tunnels in the old town

The narrow plots and deep plans of the historic centre leave a lot of internal rooms with no external wall and no available roof slope. There is no rooflight answer for a room like that, but there is a tunnel answer wherever there is a loft above.

A rigid mirrored tube runs from a small dome in the roof down to a diffuser in the ceiling and brings genuine daylight into a room that has never had any. It is the cheapest daylight in this trade by a wide margin, and the roof component is small and low enough that on a rear slope it is frequently invisible from any public vantage point, which matters in a conservation area.

Three things decide whether it works properly.

Rigid rather than flexible. A rigid mirrored tube reflects 98 percent or better at each bounce. A flexible foil concertina reflects perhaps 80 percent and scatters light at every fold, and over a run from a roof down to a ground floor ceiling that difference is most of the light.

Diameter. Output goes with area rather than width, so a 350mm tube passes roughly twice the light of a 250mm one. 250mm suits an internal WC, 350mm a landing or a decent bathroom, 530mm a room you actually live in.

Insulation and sealing. The tube is insulated where it crosses the cold loft and the ceiling ring is sealed airtight, or warm moist room air gets into the tube, condenses on the cold metal, and arrives at the diffuser looking exactly like a leak.

It is not a rooflight and we will not pretend otherwise: no view, no ventilation, no sense of sky, and nothing after dusk. Most units take an optional light fitting inside the diffuser so the same ceiling opening does both jobs.

On a listed building it still needs consent. A sun tunnel is not exempt for being small.

Timescales

Consent is the long part rather than the fitting. A listed building consent application runs to months, and a conservation rooflight or a made to measure size adds several weeks on top. Start the application first and order the unit second.

The fitting itself is quick: a sun tunnel is usually half a day, a like for like roof window replacement a day, and a new opening with making good three to four days.

Blinds, noise and comfort

Three things worth settling before the unit is ordered.

Blinds. Mass market roof windows have clip in blackout, pleated and venetian blinds that fit exactly and cost far less than made to measure. Steel conservation units, the sort required on listed and Article 4 properties in the town centre, generally do not.

Shading. Internal blinds control light and privacy and do relatively little about heat. An external awning intercepts heat outside the glass and is far more effective on a south or west facing unit, though on an exposed estuary position it needs to be robust and properly fixed.

Noise. Rain on a roof window is louder than people expect, and here it frequently arrives driven hard off the water. An acoustic laminate inner pane cuts it substantially, costs a modest premium at the point of order, and cannot sensibly be added later because the labour and access are the same as replacing the whole unit.

What to send us

A photograph of the roof, one of the frontage showing the street and the access, and the address so we can check the listing and conservation position ourselves. For a replacement, photograph the data plate on the sash rather than measuring.

Tell us whether there is side access to the rear. In the old town that single fact changes the shape of the quotation more than the choice of unit does, because it decides whether scaffold and materials come down a side passage or through the house, and whether a highway licence is needed.

Because of the hill, it also helps to say what your roof can be seen from. A rear slope that would be screened in a flat town is frequently in full view from the streets above or from across the estuary, and an application that acknowledges that does better than one that does not.

How we work

A survey before a fixed price. An itemised written quotation naming the product, the flashing kit, the fixings and the insulation collar rather than describing a rooflight in general terms. Disposal of what comes out. A ten year guarantee on our workmanship.

Where the work is notifiable we handle Building Control, and where consent is needed we prepare the survey, the product drawing and the written description for the application.

On a hill town, an application that says plainly what the roof can be seen from does better than one that treats a rear slope as invisible. We write it that way.

Talk to us

Send a photograph of the roof and one of the frontage showing the street, and tell us the address so we can check the listing and conservation position ourselves. You will get a realistic range back the same working day wherever possible.

Where a job is urgent because water is coming in, say so and we will treat it as urgent rather than putting you in the queue.