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Pinner HA5 · Flat refurbishment

Flat refurbishment in Pinner

Listed Art Deco blocks, flats over shops and council estates

The flats in Harrow’s Pinner records include 1930s Art Deco blocks, among them two listed developments; homes above the shops of the High Street, Bridge Street, Marsh Road and Pinner Green; and flats on the housing estates the council inspects. Each brings its own consents into a refurbishment, and this page sets out what Harrow’s documents say about each, from the window frames to the parade outside.

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Start here

Flat refurbishment in Pinner at a glance

If your Pinner flat is in one of the 1930s Art Deco blocks, start with its listing, because that changes what you need for the windows and for some work inside. Pinner Court and Elm Park Court are listed grade II. Capel Gardens is locally listed only, so listed building consent does not apply there, although replacing its windows still needs planning permission. Above a shop, the questions turn on the parade and the way into the homes upstairs. On a housing estate, find out first whether Harrow Council is your landlord. In every case, read the lease next.

Planning Data (Historic England): Pinner Court, grade II, list entry 1254195 · Planning Data (Historic England): Elm Park Court and entrance arch, grade II, list entry 1261409 · Harrow: Pinner Road Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy (Appendix 13), adopted April 2019 (PDF) · Harrow: listed buildings

For the whole area, including conservation areas, permissions and working hours, read our Pinner renovation guide.

Approved guide prices

What does a flat refurbishment cost in Pinner?

A flat refurbishment in Pinner runs £900–£1,700/sqm excluding VAT, and a full two-bedroom refurbishment typically lands between £60,000 and £110,000. Most programmes take 16–32 weeks on site. A written scope and site assessment are needed before any project price can be fixed.

Scope of workGuide rateTypical total
Full flat refurbishment (2-bed)£900–£1,700/sqm£60,000–£110,000
Typical programme16–32 weeks on site

Guide rates exclude VAT and are set by depth of work, not by postcode. Compare scopes in our London refurbishment cost-per-square-metre guide or try the cost calculator.

The buildings

Pinner’s flats, block by block and parade by parade

Harrow’s documents describe Pinner’s 1930s Art Deco blocks and its homes above shops in some detail. They date from 2009 to 2022, so check how your own building is described and used today.

Pinner Court, on Pinner Road, and Capel Gardens were built in 1935–7. The 2019 appraisal for the Pinner Road conservation area describes them as six three-storey Art Deco blocks of two- and three-bedroom flats, with steel-framed, Crittall-style single-glazed windows painted verdigris green. Pinner Court has three front entrances, each serving six flats, and six servants’ entrances at the rear. It has been listed grade II since 8 March 1995, while Capel Gardens is locally listed. Check Harrow’s map for the conservation area boundary at your address.

Harrow: Pinner Road Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy (Appendix 13), adopted April 2019 (PDF) · Planning Data (Historic England): Pinner Court, grade II, list entry 1254195 · Harrow: Pinner Road conservation area map and schedule (PDF)

Elm Park Court and its entrance arch have been listed grade II since the same date. Harrow’s 2011 Character Assessment describes Elm Park Court and Pinner Court as distinctive complexes of flats of two and three storeys, finished in white render with green pantile roofs and green window frames, and notes that Elm Park Court has areas of flat roof used as roof gardens. The assessment’s ‘Art Deco flats’ type consists of just these two developments, both at Pinner, which it says are already formally protected as heritage assets.

Planning Data (Historic England): Elm Park Court and entrance arch, grade II, list entry 1261409 · Harrow: Character Assessment of Harrow’s Residential Areas, 2011 (PDF)

Above the shops, the 2009 High Street appraisal says most of the High Street’s cafés, shops, pubs, restaurants and offices have homes above, without saying which. In 2011 Harrow found the upper floors of the Bridge Street and Marsh Road parades predominantly residential, apart from some offices above Bridge Street, and recorded maisonettes above the three-storey shops fronting Pinner Green. A 2022 committee report described one Bridge Street parade with homes on its upper floors.

Harrow: Pinner High Street Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy, adopted December 2009 (PDF) · Harrow: Character Assessment of Harrow’s Residential Areas, 2011 (PDF) · Harrow: Planning and Developments, with the link to search Harrow’s planning register

Permissions and local rules

Consents for a Pinner flat, building by building

Windows at Pinner Court and Capel Gardens

What does replacing a window involve?

For the flats at Pinner Court and Capel Gardens, the 2019 management strategy encourages repair rather than replacement. Replacing the windows needs planning permission, plus listed building consent at Pinner Court, where secondary glazing needs listed building consent too. If the existing windows can be shown to be beyond repair and the replacement would be like for like, the council would support it, and any approval would be likely to require staged, uniform replacement of each elevation. It notes some residents’ concern about heat loss and condensation, and a dismissed 2016 appeal over double-glazed units at Capel Gardens.

Harrow: Pinner Road Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy (Appendix 13), adopted April 2019 (PDF)

Inside the Art Deco blocks

Does listing reach into a flat?

It can, where the work affects the listed building’s special interest, and Harrow decides whether it does. The 2019 appraisal records that many flats at Pinner Court and Capel Gardens keep period features: good joinery in the common stairwells and entrance halls, and fireplaces, cornices and other details within the flats. At Pinner Court, ask Harrow before altering them. Capel Gardens is locally listed only, so listed building consent does not apply, and work affecting only its interiors is not development.

Harrow: listed buildings · Harrow: Pinner Road Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy (Appendix 13), adopted April 2019 (PDF) · Planning Data (Historic England): Pinner Court, grade II, list entry 1254195 · When planning permission is required

Homes above shops and parades

What do Harrow’s policies say about a flat over a shop?

Harrow’s adopted Local Plan lists Pinner Green, opposite and east of the Ash Hill Drive junction, among its neighbourhood parades under the heading Pinner and Hatch End. Its Policy LE1 supports homes in town centres, but providing access to homes upstairs is appropriate only where any active frontage or floorspace lost in a primary shopping area, town centre frontage or neighbourhood parade is carefully managed. Behind the High Street, the 2009 appraisal records pressure from food and drink outlets for external flues and extra accommodation at the rear, and says these often-forgotten service areas can become cluttered with extensions.

Harrow Local Plan 2021–2041, the adopted plan (PDF) · Harrow: Pinner High Street Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy, adopted December 2009 (PDF)

If Harrow Council is your landlord

Which flats come under Harrow’s rules for its leaseholders?

Harrow’s list of housing estates it inspects includes Pinner Green & Antoneys Close, with Pinner Green, Hazeldene Drive, Antoneys Close and Millman Close, and the Mill Farm & Jubilee Close Estate, whose roads and blocks include Rickmansworth Road, Jubilee Close, Pinner Hill Road Flats and Edwin Ware Court. The list does not say which homes are the council’s. If you bought a council flat or maisonette, through Right to Buy or from a previous owner, you need written permission from Harrow’s Housing department before any change, and any planning permission or building control is separate, for you to apply and pay for.

Harrow Council: council estate inspections and projects, 2026/27 list · Harrow Council: leaseholders of council flats and maisonettes · Harrow Council: home alterations permission for leaseholders

Working hours, skips, parking and the conservation area maps for the whole area are in our Pinner guide. Local guidance checked ; requirements depend on the address, the building and the complete proposal.

What the work covers

What the work on a Pinner flat includes

Steel windows, surveyed before anything is ordered

In a 1930s block, each steel window is checked for corrosion, cracked glass and casements that are hard to open, and its paint colour is recorded. Overhaul and draught-proofing are priced before replacement, and any change of frame, colour or opening is drawn for the freeholder and for Harrow first. At Pinner Court and Capel Gardens, the Pinner Road appraisal says the windows’ painted finish links them with the painted balcony ironwork and the guttering.

Harrow: Pinner Road Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy (Appendix 13), adopted April 2019 (PDF)

Floors, noise and the homes around you

Your floor is a neighbour’s ceiling, and above a shop it sits over a business. The scope records the existing floor build-up before hard flooring or a new layout is chosen, and keeps noisy rooms over noisy rooms where it can. In one 2022 report on a Bridge Street parade, officers noted that some kitchens and living spaces would sit over bedrooms, so extra noise-transfer measures would be needed for building control.

Harrow: Planning and Developments, with the link to search Harrow’s planning register · GOV.UK: Approved Document E, resistance to sound

Common parts, entrances and deliveries

Work in a block is planned around its shared parts. The scope agrees with the freeholder or managing agent which entrance and stair the trades use, how stairwell joinery and floors are protected, where waste is held and when noisy work may happen. In a block with front and rear entrances, such as Pinner Court, that choice affects every delivery and every neighbour.

Harrow: Pinner Road Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Strategy (Appendix 13), adopted April 2019 (PDF) · LEASE: alterations and home improvements

How we work

How we run a Pinner flat refurbishment

  1. First visit

    We see the flat, then the entrance, stairs or lift that serve it.

  2. Lease and consents

    We go through the lease’s consent requirements with you and the managing agent at the start.

  3. Survey and design

    Drainage and services are traced on site. Our own architects and structural engineers design the layout and any structural change around those routes, and any new external vent or window is checked for planning.

  4. Price and contract

    A fixed written price and a JCT contract follow the survey, scope and specification. The price names its allowances and exclusions, with consent fees and any common-parts work shown separately.

  5. Working in the building

    Common parts are protected and their condition recorded; deliveries keep to the building’s rules, and noisy work to those rules and the council’s permitted hours; key decisions go to a director.

  6. Handover

    Commissioning, drawings, certificates and any managing-agent close-out. Completed work carries a 12-month defects-rectification period under the JCT contract terms.

Real projects, clearly located

Examples of our flat refurbishment work elsewhere in London

None of these projects is in Pinner. Each card names where the work was done, so you can judge the finish and the approach before you brief your own.

Your brief

Before you ask for a quotation

  1. Name the block or parade

    Give the full address and the name of the block or parade: Pinner Court, Elm Park Court, Capel Gardens, a flat above a shop on the High Street, Bridge Street, Marsh Road or Pinner Green, or a flat on a housing estate. Say which floor the flat is on and what lies above and below it.

  2. Send the lease and your landlord’s details

    Send a copy of the lease, especially its clauses on alterations, with any house rules for the block and the freeholder’s or managing agent’s name. Tell us if you bought your home as a council flat or maisonette, by Right to Buy or from an earlier owner, because Harrow’s own permission process then applies.

  3. Record what you want to keep

    Photograph the windows inside and out, the entrance door and any fireplace, cornice, joinery or balcony ironwork, then list what you hope to change. In a listed block those photographs help identify the consents before design starts, and in any block they show the freeholder exactly what is proposed.

Ready to take the next step? Send the address and a short outline of the work.

Book a free feasibility visit

Questions before you begin

Flat refurbishment in Pinner: questions

Do conservation-area rules apply to work on a flat?

For work on the outside of the building, they can. Flats have no householder permitted development rights, so for the alterations and additions those rights cover, planning permission should be sought. Harrow’s 2009 Pinner SPD said greater public awareness of what needs permission is particularly relevant for blocks of flats and businesses, whose individual owners or occupiers may not know how strict planning controls are. Ask Harrow before ordering new windows, a door onto a balcony, a satellite dish or an outside vent.

Harrow: Pinner Conservation Areas Supplementary Planning Document, adopted December 2009 (PDF) · Householder permitted development technical guidance

Can a flat above a Pinner shop be in a flood zone?

That depends on the address. In 2022 a committee report on one Bridge Street parade recorded parts of the site as within Environment Agency Flood Zone 2, and its flood section placed the development in Flood Zone 2 on the flood map as it then stood; a Flood Risk Assessment was provided and the council’s drainage engineer raised no objection. That describes one site in 2022, not the street, and the map may since have changed. Check your own address with GOV.UK.

Harrow: Planning and Developments, with the link to search Harrow’s planning register · Check long-term flood risk in England

What does Harrow ask of the front garden when a house becomes flats?

Harrow’s adopted Local Plan requires a conversion to add soft landscaping to the forecourt, even where it is already largely hard surfaced, and asks for cycle storage in the rear garden or at the side, not at the front. Its 2010 design guide adds that in most cases a forecourt has room for one parking space only, normally for the ground-floor flat, and that high railings and gates are unacceptable. Its 2011 assessment found the loss of landscaping and boundaries to parking affecting the character of every type of flat it describes.

Harrow Local Plan 2021–2041, the adopted plan (PDF) · Harrow: Residential Design Guide Supplementary Planning Document, adopted 15 December 2010 (PDF, file 23276) · Harrow: Character Assessment of Harrow’s Residential Areas, 2011 (PDF)

Can I extend into the roof space above my flat?

If Harrow Council is your landlord, no: it will not grant its leaseholders permission to buy and extend into the loft space, nor permission for ground-floor extensions on its estates. In other blocks, ask the freeholder first, because the lease sets out what you own and may alter. A roof extension is also development needing planning permission and, at a listed block such as Pinner Court or Elm Park Court, listed building consent where it affects special interest.

Harrow Council: home alterations permission for leaseholders · LEASE: alterations and home improvements · Householder permitted development technical guidance · Harrow: listed buildings

Will my flat’s front door be checked under the fire-door rules?

Only in some buildings. Since 23 January 2023, the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 have required the responsible person for a multi-occupied residential building with storeys over 11 metres to endeavour to check every flat entrance door onto the common parts once a year, self-closing devices included. Ask the freeholder or managing agent whether your building is one of these, and agree any new entrance door with them before it is ordered, whatever the height of the block.

GOV.UK: Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022, fact sheet on fire doors (regulation 10)

How much does a flat refurbishment cost in Pinner?

Guide rates in Pinner are £900–£1,700/sqm excluding VAT, with a full two-bedroom refurbishment typically between £60,000 and £110,000, over a 16–32 weeks programme. A written scope and site assessment come before any fixed price.

Book a free feasibility visit

Talk to us about your Pinner flat

Tell us the address and what you want to change in your Pinner flat. We reply within one working day, Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.

Or call 020 7101 3168. We serve Pinner from our studio at Unit 3, Palace Court, 250 Finchley Road, London NW3 6DN.

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