Roofs in a seaside town that grew from 101 people.
Hove counted 101 people in 1801 and over 4,000 fifty years later, with Grade I terraces and an Article 4 direction in Brunswick Town. Each roof is surveyed, photographed, then priced once in writing.
Named streets in Brunswick Town sit under a full Article 4 direction, approved in August 1993. Before any change to a roof there, we ask the city council what the direction means for that address.
Slate roof on a terraced house
Brunswick Square and Brunswick Terrace are listed Grade I, and their roofs are part of that listing. On a listed house, roof work begins with a conversation with the council, not with a scaffold.
Period terrace with a pitched roof
Hove's development into a watering-place began in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. Houses went up across several decades, so the survey reads each roof for its own build, repairs and covering.
Seaside town rooftops with chimneys
Map of Hove and the neighbourhoods around it, with Crawley for reference.
Hove lies along the coast west of Brighton, beyond the west cliff, and its old parish reached north to the lower Downs.
Hove job notes
Three short chapters on how Hove grew, what the Brunswick Article 4 direction means for a roof job, and which questions one city council answers.
Stage 01 · Growth
Hove grew quickly once it became a watering-place, so its roofs carry repairs and alterations from many periods.
The Victoria County History places Hove along the coast west of Brighton, beyond the end of the west cliff, with a parish that stretched north to the lower slopes of the Downs. In 1801 its population was only 101. Fifty years later it was over 4,000, and its growth into a watering-place had started in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. The Municipal Borough of Hove received its royal charter in 1898. A place that changes that fast does not end up with one kind of roof, and a Hove survey begins from that fact.
Before the main work begins
Quite a lot. When a roof has been mended at several points over many decades, we can find a mixture of materials, fixings and flashing styles on one slope. None of it is wrong in itself, but each patch is a place where two different methods meet, and that is where water tends to find a way in. We photograph each junction so you can see what we mean. Then we choose between repairing in the style already there or tidying the lot, and the written price follows the choice you make.
By setting up access properly before anything else. A tall house, a narrow side passage or a roof behind a parapet might need a tower, a ladder stood on a safe base or a full scaffold, and we plan which at the survey instead of improvising on the day. For stacks and flashings we look at the joints from close range, because a stain on a ceiling below rarely sits under the part that has failed. The loft gets inspected from inside as well, since daylight through the covering or damp on the timber underneath helps us trace a leak to its source. Our pitched roofing page explains how tile, slate, batten and underlay repairs work.
No. Natural slate that has been looked after can last 100 years or more, according to the CoRC guide, while Marley puts concrete tile at around 60 years with a warning that this is no guarantee. A slipped slate or a failed flashing is a repair, and the written price says plainly when that is all the roof needs.
Stage 02 · Rules
Parts of Brunswick Town carry a full Article 4 direction, approved in August 1993, so a roof there starts with a question to the council.
Brunswick Town and Old Hove are both conservation areas. Within Brunswick Town, a full Article 4 direction, approved in August 1993, covers named streets: Cavendish Mews, Cross Street, Farman Street, Ivy Mews, Ivy Place, Kerrison Mews, Lower Market Street, and parts of Upper Market Street and Waterloo Street. An Article 4 direction lets a planning authority withdraw chosen permitted development rights across a defined area, so work that needs no application elsewhere in Hove may need one here. Brighton & Hove City Council holds the direction, and it is the council that says what it covers at your address.
Brunswick terms
It means we ask before we change anything. A slipped slate put back with a matching slate keeps the roof as it was, which is the simplest job anywhere. A different covering, a new roof window, a dormer or the loss of a chimney is another matter, and in these streets we put each of those to the council before pricing. Pairs and terraces add a further reason for care, because a roof that changes on one half of a pair looks wrong beside the half that did not. So on a Brunswick roof, we match slate to slate and show you the sample before ordering. If the old slates are sound, they can be lifted, the battens and underlay renewed and the same slates relaid, which keeps the look and the character of the terrace. Our chimney repairs page explains pointing, flaunching and flashing, and in these streets we check with the council before any stack is taken down.
In the named streets, any change to a roof starts as a planning question.
The council answers that for the Article 4 streets, and the rules for roofs more widely are different again, so rather than summarise them we send you to our post on planning permission for roof work, and then to the council's planning team. Other directions exist elsewhere in Hove, so ask Brighton & Hove City Council which, if any, covers your street.
No, only the ones the direction names, and the line between covered and uncovered can run along a single street. We check the council's description against your address and tell you in writing which side you are on, so that the price you receive already reflects the rules that apply. The mews houses deserve a second look, because their small roofs are easy to alter without a thought for the rules.
Stage 03 · Permissions
Brighton & Hove is a single unitary council, so planning, building control and listed building questions all go to one address.
Brighton & Hove City Council is a unitary authority, which means one council answers for planning and building control alike. Brunswick Square and Brunswick Terrace are listed Grade I, as is St Andrew's Church on Waterloo Street, which the Victoria County History dates to 1828. Listed status adds a layer: the law forbids works that affect a listed building's character unless they are authorised, so that question comes up at the survey whenever the job is more than a plain repair.
The Planning Portal's national test has two limbs: under 25 per cent of the building envelope, and under 50 per cent of the roof. Stay under both figures and no application is normally needed. A new covering weighing 15 per cent or more beyond the old tips it the other way, as does a covering that performs very differently if there is a fire. If your survey points to a complete renewal, the roof replacement page walks through what happens next.
Hove: who to ask
Section 169 of the Highways Act 1980 requires the highway authority's licence for scaffolding that obstructs the road or pavement. Brighton & Hove City Council sets its own scaffold licence terms, so we ask it at the survey and tell you what it says before a date is set. Scaffold wholly on private land needs no such licence. Mortar, lead and slate repairs on a Grade I terrace are skilled work, and we explain what we can do and what needs a conservation specialist before you commit. Church roofs are a separate matter again, since a church in use follows its own denomination's approval route, so the parish begins with its diocese or governing body.
The Health and Safety Executive's advice is that asbestos may well be in any home built or refurbished before 2000, so it is treated as present until a test says otherwise. On a roof that can mean cement sheets over a garage or extension, or soffits that look like plain board. Asbestos cement roofing is fragile, and it is classed as non-licensed work only if it is handled carefully and not broken up, so if we suspect any, we stop and arrange testing before it is disturbed. Send your Hove postcode with a photo of whichever slope, stack or gutter is troubling you, and we start from there.
Not without asking first in the streets the Brunswick direction names. That full Article 4 direction withdraws permitted development rights there, and Brighton & Hove City Council can say whether a change of covering needs consent at your address. Mending in matching material is the simple case, so matching slate is the usual route, and the survey photographs help the council see what is there now.
Inside the streets the Brunswick direction names, ask the council before a stack or its pots come down, because the direction withdraws permitted development rights there. Elsewhere in Hove it depends on the house and its listing, and Building Regulations approval always applies when a chimney breast is removed, because it is part of the structure. The council's planning team can say which applies to your address before any work starts.
Among them are Brunswick Square and Brunswick Terrace, and St Andrew's Church on Waterloo Street, built in 1828 to designs by Sir Charles Barry. Work that alters a listed building's character needs its own consent. If your house stands near one of them, ask the city council whether a listing or the conservation area reaches it.
It can be. The Health and Safety Executive advises treating any property built or refurbished before 2000 as one that may hold asbestos. Cement roof sheets are fragile, so if we spot a suspect sheet or soffit, work on it waits until it has been tested. The written price comes after that is settled, and you are told what the test found.
Send your Hove postcode and say whether your house is listed or in Brunswick Town, and the survey gets arranged to suit.
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