Roofs in a conservation area with a slab-roofed Grade I church.
Wisborough Green's conservation area holds 40 listed buildings, among them a Grade I church roofed in Horsham slab. Every roof gets a climb and photos for you, followed by a single written total.
The restorer E Christian kept the church's Horsham slab roofs in 1867-68. Stone slabs are heavy, so work on any slab roof starts with how the weight is carried and how each piece is held.
Stone slab roof on a church
The conservation area holds 40 listed buildings, the Grade I church among them, on Historic England's list. On a listed roof, the council is consulted before any price is final.
Old cottage under a tiled roof
Kirdford and Wisborough Green were both centres of glass making between about 1300 and 1600. A place with so long a working past gives us no reason to guess, so each roof is read as we find it.
Old houses along a roofline
Map of Wisborough Green and the neighbourhoods around it, with Crawley for reference.
A Chichester district village south-east of Kirdford, home to 892 people at the 2021 Census and once a glass-making centre.
From survey to sign-off in Wisborough Green
Three chapters on a conservation area thick with listed buildings, the heavy stone and slate roofs that need careful hands, and the Chichester and county steps before a bigger job.
Stage 01 · Protection
Wisborough Green Conservation Area contains 40 listed buildings, including the Grade I parish church, so consent questions come early here.
Wisborough Green Conservation Area contains 40 listed buildings, including the Grade I church of St Peter ad Vincula, a count taken from Historic England's list. The practical point is simple. Where so many roofs are protected, the first question on a survey is often what the building may become, not just what has gone wrong with it. That changes the order of events: the council is consulted early, the roof is photographed fully, and the price is fixed last. Old repairs, patches and any paperwork from earlier work are worth mentioning too, and anything you can tell us about past jobs goes into the survey notes.
Respect for how it appears to the eye from the lane. A repair that restores identical tiles in their original colour, with the ridge and details unchanged, leaves the street as it was and keeps matters simple. A new material or profile is a different conversation. Whether an Article 4 direction touches your property is something Chichester District Council's planners can confirm for your property. Before touching anything we measure the tile, record its colour and how it is laid, so a replacement can be matched by eye and by tape.
In a village this protected, the first question is rarely the tile. It is the permission.
Before the scaffold goes up
Section 7 of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 is the clause behind the rule: nothing that affects the building's character should be done until it is authorised. A straight like-for-like repair may need nothing more than a conversation. Re-covering in another material, altering the ridge or laying new lead could each count as character, so the sensible order is the council first and a price second. Where a church is still used for worship, as St Peter ad Vincula is, the Church of England uses a separate route, a faculty, in place of listed building consent.
It alters how the roof appears from outside, so it belongs in the conversation with Chichester's planners before anything is ordered. The village's glass-making past is a pleasing coincidence, but a new window in an old roof is a decision about appearance as well as daylight. Our roof windows and skylights page explains how we fit and flash them. For the wider picture on permission, see our post on planning permission for roof work.
Stage 02 · Materials
The parish church kept its Horsham slab roofs through its restoration of 1867-68, and heavy old coverings call for slow, careful hands.
Sussex Parish Churches records that E Christian, restoring St Peter ad Vincula in 1867-68, kept the Horsham slab roofs rather than recovering them. The same attitude suits any old roof: keep what is sound, mend what is not, and be sure of the weight before any covering is swapped. A heavy roof is not a failing roof, and it often has years in it if the details around it are cared for.
Cause comes before cure. A slipped stone or slate might be a failed peg or nail, a softened batten, or a shift in the timber below, and replacing the piece without finding out why only hands the fault to next winter. We open up around the slip, check what holds the covering and photograph it. If the covering is sound we reuse it, which also keeps the colour and texture of the old roof. Should the weight of the covering change, the Planning Portal points you to an engineer or surveyor for a view on the timbers first, and approval is needed once the new covering adds 15 per cent or more. Salvage matters on stone and slate: a whole old piece is worth more than a new one that does not match, so we keep every sound one back for the repair.
Old-roof vocabulary
Cupa Pizarras says BS 5534 gives 20 degrees as the minimum pitch for natural slate, with hook fixings kept off any pitch below 25. CORC writes that slate which is well maintained can last 100 years and more, so there is every reason to repair rather than replace. The trouble comes when slate lies too shallow: water creeps up under the overlap, and no repair cures a pitch problem. We measure the slope before we quote, because the figure decides what can be reused.
Thicker sheet where the water load is greatest. Royston's cast-lead brochure sets Code 5, at 2.24mm, for flashings, valleys and box gutters, uses the lighter Code 4 for soakers among other jobs, and keeps Code 3 for soakers only. A cost guide updated in September 2026 puts lead flashing above 80 years, which is why renewing it properly beats patching it every few winters. Our lead work page covers the repairs we make.
Stage 03 · Permissions
Planning and building control both sit with Chichester District Council; the county council licenses scaffold put up over the highway.
Wisborough Green is outside the South Downs National Park, so Chichester District Council acts as the planning authority and provides building control too. That keeps the list of offices short: one for how the roof looks and how it is built, and the county for anything on the road. Two teams at the same council can answer two different questions, so we put each question to the right one. On a listed house, building control and listed building consent are separate approvals from separate teams, and we sequence them so that the start date never runs ahead of either answer.
Chichester District Council. The Planning Portal's yardstick for no application is under 25 per cent of the building envelope and under 50 per cent of the roof, and any covering at least 15 per cent heavier than the old needs approval anyway. For anything larger than a patch, we take the question to the council first and let the answer shape the date and the written price. Our roof replacement page follows a full job from first survey to final check.
Looking over a Wisborough Green roof
When the scaffold has to sit over the lane or the footway, West Sussex County Council, as highway authority, grants the licence. Its terms are a minimum of 10 working days' notice and £266 for one month. Inside your own fence no licence comes into it. If the lane is the only choice, we ask who applies and co-ordinate the paperwork with the scaffolder; the start date then waits for the notice period rather than racing it. In a village, neighbours like a warning, and they get ours before the first pole goes up.
Work stops. Bats are fully protected, roosts included, and roof repair is named in GOV.UK guidance as something that can affect them. Birds fare no worse: the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 catches anyone who intentionally destroys a nest in use. Gaps beside a beam, a stone or a tile edge suit birds and bats alike, so we look closely at those on an old roof. When there are signs, we photograph them, explain what they mean and settle the plan with you before anyone lifts another piece. Timing can then matter as much as method.
Often, yes. If the battens and fixings behind the slipped pieces are sound, the good pieces are reused and only the failed ones replaced, matched as closely as possible. We open up around the fault, photograph what we find, and put the whole job into a single written total, saying whether a patch or something larger makes sense.
Search the Historic England list, or ask Chichester District Council's planning team. The conservation area has 40 listed buildings, but standing inside it does not list yours. Knowing before the survey lets us plan around consent, and a listed roof gets that conversation before a price is fixed or a single tile is lifted. It also protects you from paying for work that would later have to be undone.
West Sussex County Council, as highway authority, if scaffold takes up any road or pavement. Its notice period is 10 working days and its charge £266 for a month. No highway licence is needed for scaffold inside your own fence. We settle the timing with the scaffolder so the booked date stands, and a narrow lane is where that planning earns its keep. Ask who applies for the licence before you agree a start date.
Send a photo of the slab, slate, tile or lead causing you concern, together with your postcode and whether the building is listed. After the survey our own pictures of your roof arrive with one total, written down. If consent is needed, we flag it at that point, before anything is booked.
Your postcode, a photo of the slab, slate or lead you doubt and a word on any listing: that is all a survey booking needs.
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