Roofs on a North Downs hilltop settlement near the Surrey border.
Biggin Hill is a hilltop settlement in the London Borough of Bromley, named after a farm. We check each roof on the day, photograph what we find and price the work in writing.
The town takes its name from Biggin Hill Farm, and the place first appears in an ancient deed of 1499. A name says nothing about a roof, so on every house we look at the tiles, the fixings and the loft before forming a view.
Tiled roof seen from the garden
Aperfield, once Apuldre, is first mentioned in about 1242, and Aperfield Court was bought in 1898 by the man described as Biggin Hill's founder. Houses here can be of any age, so we date a roof from what lies under the tiles.
Battens and tiles on a pitched roof
St Mark's Church, the war memorial and Norheads Farmhouse are all listed Grade II. If your own house is listed, ask Bromley's planning team before any roof work that could change its character.
Old church roof in clay tiles
Map of Biggin Hill and the neighbourhoods around it, with Crawley for reference.
Biggin Hill sits on the North Downs in the old Kent parish of Cudham, near the Surrey border, and now falls under Bromley.
Biggin Hill job notes
Three short chapters on wind and age at the roof edge, the rules Bromley applies to bigger jobs, and how scaffold and bats are handled on site.
Stage 01 · First look
Biggin Hill stands on the North Downs, so we read its roofs with wind, exposure and age in mind rather than guessing from the postcode.
Two old names sit behind Biggin Hill. Biggin Hill Farm gave the town its name, and an ancient deed of 1499 is where the place first appears on paper. Aperfield, once written Apuldre, turns up around 1242, and the name seems to mean a field of apple trees. In 1898 Frederick H. Dougal, later described as the founder of Biggin Hill, bought Aperfield Court. Neither date helps with your tiles. A deed cannot say how a ridge was fixed or whether the felt beneath the battens has perished, so the survey does that job.
On a hilltop roof survey
Up on the North Downs a house has few windbreaks, and gusts arrive from several directions. They find the weak points along the verge, the sloping side edge where a gable wall meets the tiles, and along the ridge, the high line where two slopes join. Mortar cracks there, then drops away, and a gap at a verge lets rain reach the timber underneath, so a small repair costs less than replacing rotted battens later. Marley reads the 2014 revision of BS 5534 as meaning that ridge and hip caps need a mechanical fixing, because mortar alone cannot be relied upon. A dry system answers that with clipped caps, and BS 8612 is the test standard such systems are measured against. Neither standard is a legal requirement, so we set out both routes and let the survey photos guide your choice. Our dry ridge and dry verge page sets out how each one is built.
Less than the fixings around them. For concrete tiles Marley's figure is about 60 years, though Marley adds that this promises nothing, while for clay the Building Research Establishment sets a minimum of 60 years. Well-kept slate can pass a century. The mortar, the nails and the felt at the eaves can fail well before the tiles do, and that is repair work rather than a new roof. While we are at the eaves we look at the fascia, the board that carries the gutter, and the soffit, the panel under the overhang, since a sagging gutter pushes rain back beneath the first course of tiles. The written price then covers whatever the survey shows and nothing the roof does not need. Our pitched roofing page covers tiles, battens and underlay.
Stage 02 · Permissions
Biggin Hill falls under the London Borough of Bromley, so a roof job that grows beyond repair starts with a conversation with its teams.
Replacing a few slipped tiles or rebedding a ridge keeps the roof looking the way it did, and section 55 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 excludes work that does not materially change how a building looks from outside. Bromley's teams are the right first call for anything that alters the roof as seen from the road. The picture changes once a repair becomes a re-roof, once a new covering goes on, or once scaffold needs the street. Biggin Hill answers to the London Borough of Bromley for both planning and building control, with the Greater London Authority above it.
Terms from the roof edge
Start with the Planning Portal's test. Building control is normally not needed if less than 25 per cent of the building envelope is affected and less than 50 per cent of the roof is touched. The envelope takes in walls, floor, roof, windows, doors and roof windows. A heavier covering changes things: a rise in weight of 15 per cent or more needs approval, as does a covering whose fire performance differs significantly from the old one. Because clay, concrete and slate weigh differently, a change of material deserves a conversation, and the Planning Portal suggests asking a structural engineer or surveyor first. Where a survey points to a big re-roof, we mention it in the written price and suggest ringing Bromley's building control team before a date is set. Dormers and roof windows sit under planning rules of their own, set out in our post on planning permission for roof work. For the job itself see our roof replacement page.
A small repair seldom needs a form; a change of covering is where the questions begin.
Before that, ask the London Borough of Bromley if a conservation area boundary crosses your road, which matters once a re-roof goes beyond like for like. Listed buildings follow other rules. St Mark's Church, the war memorial and Norheads Farmhouse each carry Grade II listings, and works that affect a listed building's character can need listed building consent. A church still used for worship is handled by its own denomination; for the Church of England the route is a faculty. If your house is listed, ask Bromley's planning team before booking, and send us the list entry so the survey allows for it.
Stage 03 · On site
A safe scaffold, a clear route for materials and a licence where the street needs one decide how a Biggin Hill job runs.
Access is the practical heart of a re-roof. Scaffold lets us work safely and keeps the edge of the job clean, and its position decides whether a licence enters the picture. On a hilltop plot we also think about where wind will catch sheeting and loose materials, because that shapes where things are stacked.
The Highways Act 1980, section 169, requires a licence from the highway authority for scaffolding that obstructs the highway. On private land none is required, which is why a driveway or front garden with spare room is the first place we look. If the poles must go on the pavement, we sort the licence out together with the scaffolder and find out how much warning the authority wants. Terms vary by council and move from year to year, so we check Bromley's current ones once we know the street is involved, and it is worth asking any roofer whether their price covers VAT and scaffolding. The start date follows the licence. We let the neighbours know before the poles arrive.
Before the scaffold goes up
Bats, their breeding sites and their resting places are fully protected, according to government guidance, which counts re-roofing among the work that may affect a roost. Wild birds fall under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, which makes it an offence to intentionally harm a nest while the birds are using it or building it. Signs at the survey mean we stop the clock and talk to you, because the plan may have to change before a single tile moves.
On day one you know where the materials will be stacked, which way waste leaves and what each day holds: scaffold up, roof opened, roof sealed. Old tiles, battens and mortar come down in controlled loads and go away with us. A stripped slope is covered before we leave, and wind in the forecast changes the plan for that day. If the gutters or fascias are part of the job, we agree the order of work so the roof is watertight before the roofline is taken apart. Each evening the site is left safe, with ladders secured and loose materials cleared away from the path. For the survey we need only a picture of the area causing worry and your postcode.
Not on its own. The deed of 1499 and the mention of Aperfield around 1242 show how long people have lived here, not how any given house was roofed, and a roof may have been patched or replaced since it was built. So we read your own covering, battens and underlay and show you what we find in photos.
It changes where we look. Open ground lets wind reach the roof edges, so we test how the ridge and verge are secured, whether the bedding is cracked and whether anything besides mortar holds the caps. Rebedding with fixings or fitting a dry system is a choice to make after the survey, with the photos in front of you.
A listing covers the building named in it. When your own house is listed, works affecting its character can need listed building consent, so speak to Bromley's planning team before booking us. Listed status belongs to the building, not the street. If only a neighbour's building is listed, mention it when we survey, and the council can confirm whether it matters for you.
Your postcode, plus a photo of the slope, ridge, verge or gutter causing concern, snapped from the lawn or the pavement, so nobody needs a ladder. A line on when you spotted the problem helps, and so does any earlier repair you know about. We then survey the roof, share photos of what we found on it, and put one total price in writing.
Send your Biggin Hill postcode with a photo of the ridge, verge or gutter you are unsure about, and we will arrange the survey.
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