Kitchen Renovation in South Hampstead, NW6
South Hampstead kitchens turn up on raised ground floors, in lower floors beside the garden and inside mansion flats, and the floor they are on sets the drainage, the extract and often the lease questions.
On Belsize Road the terraced houses are three storeys over a basement, and on Cleve Road and the west end of Compayne Gardens some detached houses stand on raised basements.
So our first kitchen question in NW6 is which floor the room belongs on, since that choice fixes where the waste runs, where the extract leaves the building and how the garden is reached.
Source: Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011)
Lower ground, raised ground and the garden
From Broadhurst Gardens down to Aberdare Gardens, the semi-detached houses rise three or four storeys.
Beyond Fairhazel Gardens, towards Finchley Road, the terraces were built as mansion blocks, mostly three and four floors high and five along Canfield Gardens.
In a tall house we compare a kitchen on the garden floor with one on the entrance floor, weighing stairs, daylight and drainage, before the client chooses.
Where the garden is lower than the kitchen we draw the steps, the threshold and the drainage falls as one detail.
Source: Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011)
Garden doors at the back of the house
Most South Hampstead back elevations are seen not from the street but from the private open spaces and from neighbouring houses.
Changes at the rear are expected to follow the original pattern of the houses and keep their historic features.
Camden wants original features retained and refurbished, with replacement reserved for parts shown to be past repair.
Where a kitchen gains wider doors to the garden, we keep the old window heads and brick arches in view and match the new opening to them.
Source: Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011)
Opening walls and taking out chimney breasts
A new or wider opening in an outside wall needs the brickwork above supported, usually on two beams with proper bearings and padstones where loads must be spread.
Each steel is normally boxed in for fire resistance, usually with at least two layers of fixed plasterboard.
An internal chimney breast can go without planning permission, but its removal always requires building regulations approval, and the Planning Portal advises an engineer's drawings and calculations.
The stack outside is another matter: the 2026 direction covers altering or demolishing a chimney visible from the street, and the appraisal expects stacks and pots to stay.
Props, beam and padstones go in during one visit, so the floors above are never left without support overnight.
Sources: Planning Portal: Extensions, Building Regulations: Structural Opening, Planning Portal Interactive House: Do I need permission to remove chimney breasts?, Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Article 4(1) Direction (made 4 June 2025, confirmed 9 June 2026), Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011)
Extract ducts, flues and the street front
For every new kitchen the Planning Portal calls for extract ventilation to take away steam and cooking smells.
Camden's direction now makes a new or altered flue on a house a planning matter wherever passers-by would see it.
Flues for biomass heating or combined heat and power on the front need permission too, and Camden asks applicants to show they tried passive energy savings before new equipment.
The appraisal adds that prominent cable runs and other external equipment can harm a historic building, and asks for discreet solutions.
We send the extract to a side or rear wall, or up an internal riser, and show the outlet on the planning drawings.
Sources: Planning Portal: Extensions, Building Regulations: Ventilation, Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Article 4(1) Direction (made 4 June 2025, confirmed 9 June 2026), Camden: Swiss Cottage (now South Hampstead) Conservation Area Article 4(1) fact sheet (updated June 2026), Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011)
Kitchens in mansion flats and divided houses
Among purpose-built flats, the appraisal singles out King's Gardens on West End Lane and the 1930s West End Court on Greencroft Gardens as important to the area.
Several blocks on wartime bomb and gap sites, Broadfield on Broadhurst Gardens among them, are largely owned by Camden.
A lease can require the landlord's consent for alterations, LEASE explains, and a covenant that floors be carpeted may stop boards or laminate going down.
Before units are ordered we agree with the managing agent where the extract will exit and how the sink joins the shared waste stack.
Sources: Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011), LEASE: alterations and home improvements
Kitchens in a listed building
A kitchen on the Alexandra Road Estate is in a listed building: Historic England lists the estate at Grade II*, and it has its own conservation area.
According to Camden's guide, new kitchen units in a listed home would not normally need consent, whereas extra fixings into the fabric, or new pipes, flues and vents, would.
The appraisal requires listed building consent for internal alterations, and doing listed building work without consent is an offence.
Sources: Historic England list entry 1130403 (Alexandra Road Estate), published on Planning Data, Camden Council: Alexandra Road Estate Conservation Area appraisal and management strategy, Camden: Swiss Cottage (now South Hampstead) Conservation Area Design Guide (updated June 2026), Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011), Camden Council: Listed buildings
Building regulations and gas
Fresh sockets, most circuit work away from baths and showers, and a new sink in place of an old one are on GOV.UK's exempt list, so a straightforward refit may need no building control approval.
Where steel goes in, a kitchen may need building regulations approval as well as any planning permission, as GOV.UK treats them separately.
A registered gas engineer connects and tests the hob and boiler work, and the certificates are handed over with the kitchen.
Sources: GOV.UK: when you don't need building regulations approval, GOV.UK: Building regulations approval
Cabinets made for older rooms
Our cabinet makers measure the real walls, which are rarely square in a house of this age, and build units in our joinery workshop so tall cupboards stop below the cornice.
Where a bay or a tall sash lights the room, worktops and wall units are set out to keep the glass clear.
Painted fronts are sprayed off site, and fixing marks are touched in on the last day.
Questions about South Hampstead kitchens
May my cooker hood vent through the front of the house?
A flue that people in the street could see now needs planning permission; venting to the side or rear avoids the problem.
Is building control involved in a simple kitchen swap?
Usually not: replacement sinks and new sockets appear on GOV.UK's exempt list.
Can the chimney breast come out?
Internally, without planning permission, but always with building regulations approval and an engineer's design.
Will my lease let me put oak boards in the kitchen?
Read the floor covenant first; some leases insist on carpet throughout.
Does a new kitchen in a listed flat need consent?
Units alone usually not; drilling new fixings or adding pipes, flues and vents usually yes.
Will opening the kitchen to the garden need steel?
Yes. The wall above needs support, usually two beams, protected against fire.
Sources: Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Article 4(1) Direction (made 4 June 2025, confirmed 9 June 2026), GOV.UK: when you don't need building regulations approval, Planning Portal Interactive House: Do I need permission to remove chimney breasts?, LEASE: alterations and home improvements, Camden: Swiss Cottage (now South Hampstead) Conservation Area Design Guide (updated June 2026), Planning Portal: Extensions, Building Regulations: Structural Opening
Sources
- Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Strategy (February 2011)
- Planning Portal: Extensions, Building Regulations: Structural Opening
- Planning Portal Interactive House: Do I need permission to remove chimney breasts?
- Camden: South Hampstead Conservation Area Article 4(1) Direction (made 4 June 2025, confirmed 9 June 2026)
- Planning Portal: Extensions, Building Regulations: Ventilation
- Camden: Swiss Cottage (now South Hampstead) Conservation Area Article 4(1) fact sheet (updated June 2026)
- LEASE: alterations and home improvements
- Historic England list entry 1130403 (Alexandra Road Estate), published on Planning Data
- Camden Council: Alexandra Road Estate Conservation Area appraisal and management strategy
- Camden: Swiss Cottage (now South Hampstead) Conservation Area Design Guide (updated June 2026)
- Camden Council: Listed buildings
- GOV.UK: when you don't need building regulations approval
- GOV.UK: Building regulations approval
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