Skylights & rooflights in Forest Town
Forest Town runs on straight streets of semis, bungalows and short terraces, hard up against Mansfield. We fit skylights and rooflights to roofs like these, and each job comes with a written note of what will need changing in later years and how that is done.
What the roofs of Forest Town ask for
Forest Town is a place of regular streets, built in runs, with the same roof repeated house after house. That sameness helps us, because a loft or an extension that looks like its neighbours usually behaves like them too. It also means the odd one out, the converted garage or the bungalow with a dormer, needs reading by itself.
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Bungalows with a deep middle
A bungalow roof sits low over a floor plan that is wide from front to back. The hallway and the bathroom end up a long way from any window, and a short tube or a small roof window over the passage changes the whole feel of the house without touching the walls.
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Semis with a back kitchen added on
Many of the semi-detached houses have had a kitchen or a dining room pushed out into the garden. The new room has a flat or shallow roof, and the far end is dim by mid-afternoon. A lantern, or a flat pane over the table, is what we put forward there, once the joists have been looked at.
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Tile roofs that have weathered unevenly
On a street of concrete tile roofs, the slope facing the open ground takes the wind and the slope facing the neighbours does not. Before choosing where an opening goes, we look at the tile condition on each side and set the new unit where the roof is sound.
Forest Town's houses, as we see them
Forest Town is on the eastern side of Mansfield, and like much of this part of Nottinghamshire it grew with the coal industry and then filled in during the decades after. What stands today is mostly twentieth-century housing: semi-detached pairs in brick, short terraces, and a good number of bungalows on the quieter roads. Roofs are generally pitched and tiled, with rafters at an even spacing and the loft entered from the landing, so they are straightforward to survey from inside.
Inside a typical semi, the first question is how much of the roof space could become a room. With headroom under the ridge, a roof window framed in the gap between a pair of rafters lights a bedroom or a study. Where the loft stays a store, a smaller unit over the stair stops the landing being a dark box. Rafter spacing sets the width, so we measure it before sizes are discussed.
Bungalows need a different eye. With one storey, the roof is the only place new light can come from without altering the front of the house. Roof windows can go in at the back, out of sight from the road, and serve rooms in the roof if the loft has been converted. Where a bungalow has a flat-roofed rear addition, a lantern or a flat rooflight brings light into a room that has only one window.
At the edges, Forest Town looks out towards Clipstone and the open ground beyond, where newer estates have trussed roofs built as a frame. An opening that interrupts a truss needs an engineer's design before anyone picks up a saw. We find out which type of roof you have at the survey, and we say plainly if an idea would need structural work first.
Weather matters on this side of Mansfield because the ground is open to the north and east. A slope that faces the neighbours is sheltered, and one that faces the gap between streets is not. When two roofs in the same road need the same size of unit, we may still choose a different flashing for each, since the rain reaches them from different directions.
Garages deserve a mention. A garage that has become a playroom or an office keeps its original roof, usually shallow and low, with little glazing in the walls. A flat rooflight over the desk or the sofa lights it without giving the neighbours a new window to look at, and the joists above are easy to read from inside.
Take the flat-roofed rear additions on bungalows. A lantern or flat rooflight on such a roof sits on a kerb, and what wears is the roof covering joined to it and the seals, long before the glass. From inside, the blind, the vent and the handle can be renewed without touching the roof. The survey checks the covering and its age around the kerb, the fall of the roof, the joists that will carry the new opening, and whether water pools anywhere near it. If the covering is close to needing renewal itself, the quote points that out, so the covering can be renewed at the same time and the kerb is not disturbed again when the roof is next re-covered.
Rooflights for Forest Town homes
Bungalows, semis and extended kitchens set the pattern here, so the list leans toward roof windows for lofts, flat panes and lanterns over rear additions, and sun tunnels for a windowless hall. Quotes list the unit and then the pieces that age, with the method for changing each.
Roof WindowsFor the rear slope of a semi or a converted bungalow loft, fitted between rafters and flashed into the concrete tile.
Sun TunnelsFor a hall or bathroom at the heart of a bungalow's plan, with no outer wall to take a window.
Flat Roof RooflightsOver a kitchen extension or a garage that has become a room, where one side window leaves the far end in shadow.
Roof LanternsFor a wider rear extension where the glass can rise above the roof and light the room from several sides.
Electric & Opening RooflightsFor a roof window high above a landing or stairwell, out of arm's reach, worked from a wall switch or a remote.
Misted & Failed Rooflight UnitsFor a rooflight put in when an extension was new and now clouded between the panes, where we first ask whether new glass in the old frame will do.
Planning and consents around Forest Town
Mansfield District Council
Mansfield's planners decide applications here. Many houses can have a roof window put in at the back without any application at all, though the tests behind that are national and are laid out in the planning guide. A tall lantern gets the closest look, since its height may take it beyond what is allowed.
The records we consulted put no conservation area in the middle of Forest Town, and no Article 4 direction has been recorded there either. Records only reach so far, so at survey we open the mapping the council keeps for your house. A house divided into flats sits under different rules for roof changes, and that is worth saying before anyone books a visit.
Structure comes into the picture more often than owners expect. A new opening in a pitched roof means trimming rafters, and in a flat roof it means trimming joists. Both are structural work with their own approval, and at survey we explain what the opening you want would involve.
Conservation areas
The planning records list nothing for the middle of Forest Town: no conservation area, and no Article 4 direction either. The council's own mapping for your house is still opened at survey.
Mansfield's eastern edge and what lies beyond
Forest Town sits so close to Mansfield that the two run together. Mansfield Woodhouse is just under two miles off to the north-west and the centre of Mansfield about the same distance south-west. Market Warsop is to the north, Shirebrook to the north-west, Edwinstowe to the north-east where the Sherwood woodland starts, and Sutton-in-Ashfield to the south-west. A separate page covers each of the six. Mansfield Woodhouse has older stone and brick near its middle where a slim frame suits the slope, while Edwinstowe mixes village cottages with later bungalows and semis. Clipstone, over on the edge of the open ground, is folded into this page, since its streets look much like those of Forest Town.
Forest Town
Forest Town: first visit, fitting day and the years after
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Survey
Measuring the loft and the extension roof
From central Sheffield it is about 48 minutes by road, nearly 26 miles to the south-east, and the visit fits your diary. Up in the loft we measure the rafter spacing and check the timbers for damp. On a flat extension roof we find which way the joists run, and lift an edge of the covering to see what lies beneath. We also note where the scaffold or ladders can stand on streets where cars line both kerbs.
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Kerb and flashing
Where the water is kept out
Most leaks trace back to the junction between the unit and the roof. On a tiled slope the flashing is dressed over the tile profile. Over an extension, the kerb is formed level and sealed into the covering before the glass goes on. The 10-year guarantee we give covers the workmanship at that junction, so we take our time with it.
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Handover
Paperwork and a last look at the room
Once the unit is in, we check it opens and closes cleanly, clear the roof and tidy the loft. The Building Control notification is dealt with as a step in the job, and the completion certificate follows to you. Keep it with the house papers.
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Year five
A first look at the seals
A checkpoint at five years suits roofs here, where open ground to the north and east lets wind push rain into the joint. Look at the rubber seals, the way the sash moves and the paint or lacquer round the frame. Your quote's life plan names the pieces to watch and says how each is changed, and for many units that means a visit to the room side and not a job on the roof.
Forest Town homeowners ask us about their roofs
Can a bungalow in Forest Town have a roof window without losing the loft?
Yes. A roof window set low on the back of the roof lights the room beneath it, and in a converted bungalow loft it can serve as the main window. It sits between rafters, and we check headroom at survey so the bottom edge lands at a sensible height from the floor.
Is a lantern or a flat rooflight better for my kitchen extension?
It depends on the room and the joists. A lantern gives more light from the sides and a taller feel, while a flat rooflight sits low and suits a roof close to a bedroom window or a neighbour. We look at the span, the covering and the ceiling height before we put either forward.
Do I need permission from Mansfield for a rooflight?
On a house, a back-roof window or a small flush pane often needs none. Flats and unusual sites are different, and the planning guide linked from this page lays out the conditions. We look at your address at survey and raise it straight away if an application would be needed.
Can you light a hallway in a bungalow where there is no loft room?
A sun tunnel is the answer we reach for first. A small dome on the roof is joined to a ceiling diffuser by a tube that passes through the loft. Pipes, wires and insulation decide the route, so we survey it before agreeing it will work.
Do you work in Clipstone and the villages round Forest Town?
We do. Clipstone is covered by this page, and Mansfield Woodhouse, Edwinstowe and Market Warsop each have their own. The survey and the written plan are the same wherever the house stands.
My Forest Town semi has a loft hatch on the landing. Can a roof window be fitted without moving the stairs?
A roof window on its own does not call for a new stair. In a typical semi the window lights the loft space or a room in the roof, and the existing hatch can stay. Where the loft is to become a bedroom, the stair is a separate matter: on a two-storey house, escape from a loft room is by a protected stair, not by the window. We talk through what you want the loft to be at survey and say plainly what is possible.