Silsoe cottage rows and New Estate roofs take rooflights or skylights
Silsoe grew around a great house and its gardens, and its roofs still show it. Cottage rows and a later estate: what the roof of each will accept.
Cottages of the estate village and the later New Estate
In Bedfordshire, Silsoe stands as a parish village on a main road between Bedford and Luton. That position made it a favourite halt for drovers and travellers, who stopped at the George coaching inn on the High Street, first mentioned in 1624. Its weekly market and annual fairs go back to 1318. The village grew because of the Wrest Park estate next door, and the buildings reflect that, so the housing here splits into two groups with different needs.
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Ironstone, thatch and terrace cottages near the High Street
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The New Estate, laid out after the great house was sold
Much of the older village was built for the people who worked the estate: servants, gardeners, stable hands and blacksmiths, who lived in thatched and terrace cottages, some of which still stand. The church of St James is built in local ironstone, and the estate also provided a school and a row of almshouses. Cottages of this kind have low eaves, small windows and narrow plots, and the upstairs rooms can sit tight under the roof. A slim conservation rooflight in the back slope brings light to a bedroom or a landing without changing the face the cottage shows to the lane.
Beyond the old lanes, the village has an area known as the New Estate, and housing of later date sits alongside it. Lady Lucas, the last of the de Grey family, sold the house and estate in 1917, and the village has moved on from its servant-cottage days. A house built to a later plan has a more regular layout: a rear extension, a loft that can take a bedroom, and a bathroom or hallway tucked into the middle of the house. Those positions are covered by a roof window set into the loft slope, a flat rooflight on an extension and a sun tunnel for the rooms inside.
Three Silsoe spaces that wait for the sky
A terrace cottage with a fence at the back
A small window, a close boundary and a room that is dim by three.
Sideways
Terrace cottages share walls, and they share boundaries too. The back of the house gives onto a narrow garden, and the garden ends in a fence a few steps away. A window in the back bedroom looks at that fence, and the daylight that reaches the room has to climb over it first.
The front is no better. The street side faces the lane, and the roof there is the part everyone sees. Putting a large window into it would change how the whole row reads.
Straight up
A conservation rooflight in the rear slope is made for this. Its frame is slim, its glass sits close to the covering, and from the lane it is hard to pick out. Inside, it opens the room to the sky, where no fence or neighbour stands in the way.
Because the cottages near the High Street were built for the estate, the roof construction can vary from one to the next. The survey looks at the rafters and the covering first, and the quote is written once we have seen them.
Anyone unsure about their street can call the council's planners, who will show whether it falls inside the Silsoe conservation area and whether anything extra applies to the roof. That check costs nothing and takes a short call, and it is better done before an order than after.
The terraced shape of these houses means a rooflight in the back slope also leaves the neighbouring roofs undisturbed. The work is tidy, the room is left finished inside, and the result is a bedroom with a patch of sky in the ceiling. On a clear night the first stars show above the bed, and on a wet morning rain makes a soft sound on the glass. Few things make a small cottage room feel larger than a view that runs upward.
Terms for cottage roofs
Conservation rooflight
A slim, low-profile rooflight whose frame sits close to the roof covering.
Glazing bar
A narrow bar, upright or across, that splits one sheet of glass into the look of several.
Eaves
The lower edge of the roof, where the slope meets the wall.
Rafter
A sloping timber that carries the covering and limits the width of an opening.
Article 4 direction
A council order that withdraws some permitted development rights across a set area.
Listed building consent
Permission needed for changes to a building on the national list.
A bathroom shaded by a tree
Privacy glass, a tree outside and a lamp on at noon.
Sideways
A bathroom window is small and frosted, and in a village where gardens run to hedges and trees it can look straight into foliage. In summer the leaves close over it, and in winter bare branches let in a thin grey light. The room that most needs to feel fresh is lit by the dimmest window in the house.
Opening the window for air does not help much either, because the same branches that block the light sit just outside.
Straight up
A sun tunnel brings daylight from the roof to the ceiling of a bathroom through a mirrored tube. The dome on the roof stands above the tree line, or at least above the part of the tree that shades the wall, and the diffuser gives a soft white disc of light with no view in or out. Where a loft sits above the bathroom beneath a pitched roof, a small roof window is an alternative, and one that opens suits a room that needs to clear steam.
Either answer looks upward, where the tree cannot reach. Straight up is clear.
Between the two, the choice comes down to what is above the ceiling. A sun tunnel suits a bathroom with a loft space above it, because the tube can run between the joists. A roof window needs the bathroom to sit directly under the slope. In the roof void we work out which of the two the structure will allow, and tell you.
Moisture is a real matter in a bathroom, so the finish round the opening matters. A sealed, insulated lining keeps condensation off the plaster, and every unit we fit is built to the current Building Regulations.
Questions for a bathroom survey
- Does the room sit under a slope or a flat ceiling?
- Is there a loft space above it?
- Should the unit open?
- Which tree shades the window?
A landing facing a gable wall
The stairs turn, and the one window looks at brickwork, so the top step sits in shadow.
Sideways
On a landing, the one window is set in a side wall, and the wall it faces belongs to the next house. All the window can show is a face of brick a few metres away. It lets in a reflected glow at best and takes up the space where a view should be.
The stairs and the landing are the part of the home where light matters for safety as well as comfort. A shadowed top step is easy to miss when you carry a laundry basket, and a child coming down in the dark finds it harder still. Good daylight on the stairs is a small safety measure that costs nothing to run.
Straight up
Where the stairwell rises into the roof, a roof window overhead gives the whole flight a window to the sky. The light falls down the stairs and reaches the hallway below, brightening the route from top to bottom. Roof windows come in a range of standard sizes, and the surveyor will choose one that fits between the rafters so the structure stays largely as it was.
The slope has to be steep enough to work properly. Our pitch guide explains the limits, and the measuring is done on the visit.
The drawing below shows a single landing twice: once with light from the side, once with light from the roof.
The difference shows in the corners. With a side window the light dies a metre in; with a window overhead it reaches the walls and the floor. A longer landing may take two smaller units better than one large one, and the survey will say which suits yours.
Planning in the Wrest ward and the Silsoe conservation area
Silsoe sits under Central Bedfordshire Council. Look up your street before you order: the council's heritage pages list a Silsoe conservation area dated June 2004. Permitted development still belongs to a house inside one, unless an Article 4 direction covers the road, and the council's planners can say which case is yours.
Roof glazing under permitted development is covered step by step in our planning guide. The council's planning and building pages point to the right team, the heritage and conservation page names the designated areas, and a notifiable job is reported to building control by us.
The road east from Milton Keynes
Head east from Milton Keynes: 16.7 miles of road and about 23 minutes. On the doorstep lie Clophill, Flitton and Maulden, so a Silsoe trip can take in a second house nearby.
Write to info@vertexskylightsmiltonkeynes.co.uk or message 07880 284133 on WhatsApp with your street and a line about the room that troubles you. Photos help and are optional.
Choosing a rooflight for each kind of Silsoe roof
A cottage roof in the old part of the village suits a conservation rooflight in the rear slope, and a landing under a steeper roof takes a roof window. For air as well as light, electric opening rooflights rise and close at the touch of a switch.
Above the dining table, beyond the reach of the garden doors, a later house with a flat-roofed extension can take a taller lantern or a flat rooflight. Hall and bathroom without an outside wall belong to the sun tunnel. All of them answer one problem: side windows face fences, walls and trees, while the sky above stays open.
The free visit to a Silsoe roof
The visit is free. The surveyor starts in the roof space, reading the covering, the timbers and the pitch, then looks at the room under your chosen spot. After that comes the room itself, and where daylight lands in it and where it never does.
An ironstone or thatched cottage puts structure first, because old roofs follow no standard pattern. A later house puts the extension roof, the loft and the stairs first. You receive one fixed written figure, unchanged when the day comes, a 10-year workmanship guarantee in writing, and a unit fitted to current Building Regulations with the room left finished. The quote form books the visit, and the terms are written up on the guarantee page.
Spend a minute in the room beforehand. See which wall stays bare, when the lamp comes on and what the window faces. Those details settle the position and the size, and the order only goes in once you have read the figure and agreed.
What Silsoe households want to know
Does a conservation area cover any of Silsoe?
Part of the village is covered, because the council's heritage list names a Silsoe conservation area. The planners can place your street on the map, and our planning guide covers how a rooflight is treated.
Who grants planning permission in Silsoe?
Central Bedfordshire Council. Central Bedfordshire Council decides planning in Silsoe: begin at its planning and building pages.
Can a rooflight go into an ironstone cottage roof?
A slim conservation rooflight suits a roof like this one. The covering and the timbers get checked first at the survey, and the planners at Central Bedfordshire can tell you what applies on your road.
What is the road distance between Milton Keynes and Silsoe?
It is a short one: 16.7 miles east, around 23 minutes.
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