Rooflights and skylights for bungalows and semis in Crigglestone, from the hallway to the roof room

Why the storey matters

Escape windows only serve storeys within 4.5m of the ground. A bungalow's roof-space bedroom sits within that limit, so a roof window can work. A two-storey house is a different case: its loft conversion needs a protected stair, and an escape roof window does not replace one.

Hinging choices over a bed

Where a bed head sits against the slope, a centre-pivot window, which pivots on its midline, keeps the furniture clear of the sash. With a top-hung window the sash swings outward from its head, which leaves clear headroom at the opening. In a low room the headroom matters to anyone climbing out, so we weigh it against where the bed or wardrobe stands.

Where the opening goes on the slope

The frame sits between two rafters, with trimmers across the gap to carry the load of any rafter that is cut. The cut alters how the roof is framed, so we handle the notification that structural work calls for. Indoors, the plasterboard of the sloping ceiling is trimmed to the frame and the reveal is plastered, leaving a neat white splay around the glass.

Concrete tile and slate

Older roofs are often slate and later ones concrete tile. A profiled tile is deep, so the flashing kit has to match its shape, and the tiles round the frame are lifted and relaid over the flashing.

Warmth in a room under the slope

A bedroom in the roof loses heat through its sloping ceiling, so the window matters. The roof window we fit has to achieve 1.4 W/m²K, with Window Energy Rating band B as the alternative measure. The lower the figure, the less warmth escapes through the glass.

Permission for a bungalow roof

Wakefield Council answers questions about a particular property, and the permitted development conditions for a roof window on a house are laid out on the skylight planning and Building Regulations page.

The dome and the diffuser

The kit is a rooftop dome, a reflective tube down through the void, and a diffuser fitted flush in the ceiling. The dome gathers daylight from the sky and the tube carries it down through the roof void. The diffuser spreads it across the hall ceiling, so the passage brightens without a window anywhere near it.

Through the roof void

A bungalow roof has an open void between the ceiling and the covering. The tube threads between the rafters in that void. Where cutting a rafter or joist cannot be avoided, the job counts as structural work and carries a notification, which we make. A straight tube loses less light than one that bends, so we plan the route to be as direct as the roof allows.

Setting the dome in a tiled roof

On a concrete-tile roof the dome stands on a short upstand set in a flashing shaped for the tile. The tiles are lifted around it and laid back over the flashing so water runs onto the surface below. The dome rises a small way above the tiles, which keeps the front of the bungalow looking much as it did.

Finishing the ceiling around the diffuser

The diffuser is a frosted panel set flush in the hall ceiling, and the plaster around it is finished so that the edge is straight. Painted white, the ceiling and the diffuser read as one surface by day. The tube stays out of sight in the roof void, and nothing is added to the walls of the hall.

A long hall or a turn in the passage

A hall that runs the full depth of the house may need its daylight in two places, or a tunnel at the point where the passage turns towards the bedrooms. Each position is marked from the loft before the opening is cut, so the diffuser lands where the hall needs it.

Coatings that limit the heat

Gas-filled double or triple glazing on warm-edge spacers holds heat in through the winter. A solar-control coating is the part that matters in summer, because it reduces the heat passing through the glass while still letting daylight in. A low-emissivity coating works on the heat radiated back off the inner pane. We pick the glazing for the room, which depends on how much sun reaches the roof.

Letting warm air out

An electric opening rooflight answers to a wall-mounted switch or a handset, which suits a ceiling no pole can reach. Many models include a rain sensor, which shuts the glass by itself when rain begins. Warm air rises to the roof, so an opening rooflight over the extension gives it an exit at the highest point.

Getting a supply up to the roof

A powered unit needs a supply at the opening, so the cable route is worked out alongside the kerb position.

Fitting into a roof that is already there

Where the extension roof is finished, the new kerb is built on the deck and the covering is dressed up its sides. The upstand detail differs between felt, EPDM and GRP, so the roof covering is identified before the opening is marked. A maker's stated size may be measured at the kerb's inside or at its outside, and the opening follows whichever applies.

Roof lantern or flat rooflight

On a flat roof, a lantern gives height and a flat rooflight sits lower. In the usual case a lantern climbs past 150mm above the roof, which often takes it beyond permitted development; the council can say, or the extension's own permission may already include it, and the planning guide explains the 150mm limit.