Kitchen renovation in Finchley

Plan the kitchen around movement, storage and services.

Start with the kitchen renovation brief

Map preparation, cooking, washing and storage before choosing cabinet fronts. Measure clearances with doors and drawers open, and decide which existing walls, floors and details belong in the finished room.

Coordinate the cabinetry with water, drainage, extraction, electrics and lighting. Confirm appliance dimensions and access for installation before the layout is signed off; structural alterations need their own design and approval checks.

The local building context

Barnet’s appraisal of the Finchley Church End Conservation Area, dated 31 August 2011, describes Edwardian shopping parades at the junction of Regents Park Road and Hendon Lane and modest Victorian cottages on Gravel Hill, Hendon Lane and College Terrace, where terraces such as College Terrace have slate roofs, canted bays, recessed doorways and white-painted sashes. It also records two Italianate villas in stucco and slate, Avenue House of 1859 and Hertford Lodge, which was restored and converted to apartments after a fire, and modern flats and small houses at Rectory Close and Spencer Close.

In North Finchley, the twelve Victorian villas of Moss Hall Crescent stand south of Tally Ho Corner on the western side of Ballards Lane: five semi-detached pairs and a detached house at each end, in cream stock brick under shallow slate roofs. Their 2015 appraisal found most converted into flats, with only Nos. 7 and 12 still single houses. Glenhill Close, due south of Finchley Central station, is described in its appraisal statement as 66 flats built in 1936 and from 1961, the 1936 blocks with steep concrete-tiled roofs and curved Crittall steel suntrap windows.

The name Finchley covers many streets and several conservation areas, so it cannot tell you which rules apply to one home. Use the official lookup to confirm the council, then work through that council’s conservation-area maps, the listed-building records, the Article 4 orders, the Hampstead Garden Suburb Trust’s area, the title or lease and any past planning decisions for that property. An N3 or N12 postcode, like the name itself, decides none of these questions.

Local design and consent context

Barnet publishes the legal orders for its Article 4 directions as open data. In Finchley Church End, the 2011 direction, sealed on 30 September 2011, applies only to the properties it names: 9 and 10 College Terrace; 1 to 4 Park Cottages, Morningside Cottage and 28 Hendon Lane; 1 and 2 Hendon Avenue; and Flora and Gothic Cottages on Gravel Hill. It controls listed classes of work that would front a highway, waterway or open space, such as enlarging or altering a house, and, without that frontage limit, the erection, alteration or removal of a chimney.

The appraisals also record locally listed buildings: Nos. 1–12 Moss Hall Crescent and Nos. 1–26 and 31–51 Village Road from 30 April 1986, and in Finchley Church End, Flora and Gothic Cottages, Nos. 1 and 2 Hendon Avenue and No. 287 Regents Park Road. The 2011 appraisal proposed further additions, including the parades at Nos. 2–20 Hendon Lane and Nos. 321–333 Regents Park Road, so ask Barnet whether a building is on its current local list.

Where the Scheme applies, residents need the Trust’s prior approval to alter a property’s external appearance, and its consent for significant garden changes, sheds, removing hedges and felling or pruning trees. Interior works in a freehold house generally need no Trust consent, with two exceptions the Trust names, but internal changes that need new external pipework, flues or vents do, and leaseholders whose freeholder is the Trust should ask it about internal alterations.

Access and site planning

Work out where deliveries will stop, where waste will wait for collection and how any shared hall or stair will be protected. The appraisals note very heavy traffic and parking on Regents Park Road, residents-only bays on one side of the narrow Moss Hall Crescent and, in Finchley Garden Village, where most houses have no private parking, a narrow Village Road that is often heavily parked where it crosses the green. Before scaffolding, a skip or materials occupy the road or pavement, confirm with the council which licence or bay suspension the job needs and the notice it requires; for a Barnet address, use Barnet’s highways licence and parking suspension pages.

Continue planning

The Finchley area guide · Kitchen renovation across London · Hampstead Architecture & Planning · Hampstead Chartered Surveyors

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