House extension in North Kensington

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

RBKC’s 2021 designation map shows the Oxford Gardens - St Quintin conservation area designated in 1975 and extended in 2002 and 2021, the latest phase along Latimer Road, where a March 2021 RBKC analysis had assessed the traditional terraces between North Pole Road and the Westway. That analysis says the area was first designated in 1975 for the speculative Victorian and Edwardian suburban housing on the Portobello and St Quintin estates. RBKC lists the adopted appraisal in an entry dated October 2021; the street descriptions here come from its October 2018 consultation draft.

The 2018 draft attributes houses in Bassett Road and the western parts of Oxford Gardens and Cambridge Gardens to Henry Currey, architect to the landowner Colonel St Quintin, built between 1867 and 1890 and fronted in pale gault brick, with yellow stock brick to the sides and rear. There, Oxford Gardens is almost entirely double-fronted detached houses, Cambridge Gardens has generously spaced villa pairs and Bassett Road a mixture. Where Oxford Gardens and Cambridge Gardens continue east of Ladbroke Grove, the draft describes four-storey houses over basements, with larger front gardens, mature trees and only small lightwells.

The name North Kensington and the W10 and W11 postcodes are only a starting point: on their own they cannot show who the planning authority is, where a conservation area stops, whether a building is listed or under an Article 4 direction, or what consents a job needs. Parts of the borough line with Hammersmith and Fulham were realigned by a 1995 order that took full effect on 1 April 1996: RBKC says that near Latimer Road the line now runs along the railway’s north-eastern edge, and the Neighbourhood Plan records Bracewell Road, Brewster Gardens and the south side of Dalgarno Gardens joining Kensington and Chelsea that year. So settle first which council the full address falls under; then check the address against the national list, RBKC’s Article 4 table and its conservation area map, with the title or lease and the site’s planning history to hand.

Local design and consent context

Direction 69, made on 29 January 1997 and confirmed on 28 April 1997, removes the right to lay or extend a hard surface fronting a highway at homes in wholly residential use at its addresses, among them numbers in Bassett Road, Cambridge Gardens and Oxford Gardens and parts of Barlby Road, Dalgarno Gardens, St Charles Square, St Mark’s Road and St Quintin Gardens.

Direction 88 is a Hammersmith and Fulham direction dated 13 November 1979 that RBKC still lists. At 1–55 (odd) Brewster Gardens and 2–56 (even) Bracewell Road it removes rights for all rear extensions, rear roof extensions included, and for buildings or structures within the curtilage.

Policy C2, in the streets and part streets covered by Directions 46 and 62, supports minor ridge-height changes for insulation that do not materially affect the roof’s appearance or create an uneven terrace roofline, and requires main chimney stacks to be kept; C3 resists non-permeable front-garden surfaces above the permitted development limits; C4 makes no requirement for a set-back where a ground-floor rear or side extension takes in the original side passage; C5 resists such extensions that are over 3m high at the party wall, have a roof slope over 45 degrees or infringe neighbours’ rights of light; C6 seeks to limit rear-garden outbuildings to 12 square metres of coverage, with 2.5m eaves and a 3m ridge; and C7 asks for discreet bin stores, flues, dishes and meter boxes on house fronts where permission is needed. Ask RBKC how these sit with the Local Plan 2024 for your proposal.

Access and site planning

A resident parking bay can be suspended only on at least 10 full working days’ notice, and RBKC asks for any suspension to be applied for before the licences themselves. The applicant for a highways licence must be a registered company; RBKC reviews each application within 10 working days of payment, and nothing may start on the street until it has given written approval. Scaffolding and hoardings count as temporary structures, licensed three months at a time, while a skip on the road needs a licence issued for a month at a time, and roll-on, roll-off storage containers are not allowed anywhere in the borough.

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The North Kensington area guide · House extension across London · Hampstead Architecture & Planning · Hampstead Chartered Surveyors

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