House extension in Woodford Green

Connect the added space to the existing home.

Start with the house extension brief

Begin with how the new space will meet the old rooms, garden and circulation. A measured brief should record boundaries, levels, existing drains, neighbouring windows and the parts of the building you intend to keep.

Develop daylight, structure and services alongside the floor plan. Agree which openings and finishes are included, how the existing home will be protected during construction and which decisions need surveys or approval before a quotation.

The local building context

Woodford Green and Woodford Wells conservation areas were designated in October 1970, and Woodford Green was extended in December 1981 to take in Sunset Avenue and Mornington Road, west of the High Road. Woodford Wells lies to the north along the High Road, and the 1993 scheme treats it as a continuation of Woodford Green. The 2007 appraisal places both on a ridge 60 metres above sea level, mainly on London clay, and finds their special quality in long, semi-natural open spaces, mature trees, ponds and narrow, hedged roads.

The 2007 appraisal describes tall, narrow, three-storey brick houses of the late eighteenth century on Inmans Row and the adjoining High Road; late Victorian and Edwardian houses on Broomhill Road between Grange Avenue and Fairfield Avenue, detached, semi-detached and terraced, with some flat conversions; and Mornington Road, which it singles out for its Arts and Crafts houses. In Woodford Wells the stock is more ordinary, mostly detached or semi-detached family houses in their own gardens. Yellow stock brick is common, and older roofs are natural slate or clay tile.

Redbridge’s 2007 appraisal says the boundary with Waltham Forest runs through Woodford Green, and each council has its own Woodford Green Conservation Area. Neither the place name nor an IG8 postcode tells you which council handles applications for a property, or whether it falls in a conservation area or a Local Character Area, is listed, or needs particular consents. Monkhams is also the name of a council ward, which tells you nothing about any of this. Use the council finder for the exact address first. Then ask that council about conservation area and Article 4 coverage, and check the statutory list, your title or lease, and past applications for the property.

Local design and consent context

Redbridge has 16 conservation areas. For Woodford Green and Woodford Wells its web page links two documents: the March 2007 Special Character Appraisal, which the council’s 2013 Woodford Broadway appraisal describes as a joint draft, and the Conservation Area Enhancement Scheme, adopted on 22 April 1993. Read both with their dates in mind, since what the 1993 scheme says about the borough boundary is older than the 2007 appraisal’s account.

Redbridge’s former Residential Precincts are now called Local Character Areas, and the council says they should be considered in planning decisions even though they are not designated heritage assets. The August 2023 list includes Monkhams, whose entry names inappropriate hip-to-gable roof extensions and the use of uPVC among harmful alterations, and two more next to Woodford Green Conservation Area: Empress Avenue, laid out between Woodford New Road and the High Road, and the Laing Estate of the 1930s. Local Plan policy LP33 supports development in these areas that respects their intrinsic character.

Directions have been suggested here. In 2007 the appraisal said Redbridge may consider one to protect front boundaries and front gardens in some specific areas, and in 2013 the Woodford Broadway appraisal recommended considering management proposals on directions for original doors, windows, facing brickwork, plain roof tiles, front boundaries and gardens, and for roof-lights or solar panels on visible slopes. These were suggestions, not directions; ask Redbridge whether any has since been made for your street.

Access and site planning

On the Redbridge side, a skip needs a council licence unless it stands on your own property, such as a driveway; scaffolding or a hoarding on the public highway needs its own licence, and the scaffold application must be backed by a risk assessment, method statement and the company’s public liability insurance. Materials stored on the road need a licence as well, and all these licences are charged by the complete month. A skip on parking spaces also needs a bay suspension, which the council decides within seven working days. For a Waltham Forest address, ask that council.

Continue planning

The Woodford Green area guide · House extension across London · Hampstead Architecture & Planning · Hampstead Chartered Surveyors

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