Choosing a skylight and rooflight for Golborne's terraces and lean-to kitchens
Rooflight installation in Golborne meets a mix of colliery-workforce terraces under slate, mid-century council semis and cul-de-sac estates on the old edges. Skylight work here is mostly about getting daylight into deep, narrow rooms and aged loft spaces.
18.8 road miles east of Liverpool city centre
Where does daylight run out between the front door and the kitchen of a Golborne terrace?
- The long terrace middleBetween the front room and the back kitchen of a miners' terrace, where the party walls and the outrigger leave a middle room with a single window facing a yard wall.
- The tired lean-to kitchenAt the back of a terrace where a lean-to or flat-roofed kitchen was built on, years ago, and the old roof panel has gone grey and gives almost no light.
- The estate loft roomA 1970s or 1980s estate house in a close off the main roads, with a loft room that never got its dormer and still relies on a single gable window.
Terrace middles, tired lean-tos and estate loft rooms
The homes here run from narrow terraces by the centre, through council-built semis, to brick estates and newer houses on the outer edges, and skylight installation in Golborne is matched to each.
- Lanterns for kitchen extensions on the semis, where the joists are usually generous and the room welcomes a high ceiling of glass.
- Flat rooflights for the lean-to and flat-roofed kitchens on the terrace backs, mounted on a fresh upstand rather than the old curb.
- Roof windows set into slate terrace slopes, with the flashing cut to suit the slates and the rafters sistered where they are narrow.
- Better-glazed units for the ageing rooflights on the 1980s houses, picked to meet the Part L figures while cutting the glare through the glass.
Colliery rows, council estates and the new houses at the edges
Golborne is a former coal-mining town in the Wigan borough, and the pits explain most of what you see on the ground. When the collieries around here grew, the homes for their workforce went up fast and close together: straight rows of brick terraces, many roofed in slate, two up and two down with an outrigger at the back and a yard behind that. Much of the older town is still those streets, and it is their roofs that bring most of the rooflight enquiries.
The terrace plan gives you a deep house with few windows. Light comes in at the front and the back, but the middle of the house gets very little, and the loft rooms that owners have added over the decades often rely on a single window in the gable or none at all. Back kitchens, built on in the twentieth century with a flat or a mono-pitch roof, are another common site for a new rooflight, because the old roof sheet or felt has aged and the room beneath it has never been bright.
The middle of the last century brought council-built semis and short terraces, usually with hipped tiled roofs and a lower, more even pitch. Later estates from the 1970s and 1980s added brick-and-tile semis and detached houses in culs-de-sac, many with integral garages and simple roofs of concrete tile. The newest houses, on the outer edges and on former industrial land, have roof trusses rather than the timbers of the old rows. That makes the roof window easy to plan but far narrower in the spacing it leaves.
Each type of house offers its own opening for the work. A slate terrace usually has enough clear slope at the rear for a window, though the rafters are narrow and may need strengthening around the cut. A truss roof on a new estate has to be studied before any rafter is cut, because the trusses carry the whole roof and need an engineer's say if a member would be affected. A semi with a rear extension can often take a lantern without much alteration.
| House | Typical roof | Good fit |
|---|---|---|
| Colliery terrace | Slate, with outrigger | Slate roof window, flat unit on the back kitchen |
| Mid-century semi | Hipped tile | Sun tunnel to the landing; lantern behind |
| 1970s and 1980s estate house | Concrete tile | Loft roof window; replacement unit |
| Recent build | Trussed roof | Fixed or opening unit, truss checked first |
Flat open land, long gusts and the joins that let water in
There are no hills to speak of at Golborne, which stands on low, level Lancashire plain well inland from the coast. The wind moves across the fields and the older mining ground around the town before it reaches the roofs. Most of the weather arrives from the west or the south-west, drier than on the coast but just as hard-hitting. Gusts come across open land and over low roofs, so an unprotected slope takes a push from the side, and rain that falls at an angle gets under any lap that is not properly made.
That is why the join between a rooflight and the roof carries so much weight here. On a slate terrace, the flashing is formed from lead or a flashing kit that has to be dressed over the slates and under the ones above, so the water runs on top of everything and nowhere under it. The head of the window is the weak point, because the water running down the slope hits it and has to be steered around. We check how each slate is held, since old nails and brittle slates are common after decades under the same weather.
On a concrete tile roof, the position of the opening in relation to the tile rows matters more. A window set so that a tile has to be cut awkwardly will always be harder to seal, so we choose the size and placement with the tile courses in mind before we mark the rafters. Back at the yard side, a flat roof can be a cause of anxiety, because a worn felt or a cracked asphalt layer will fail once any new work puts strain on its edges. If the surface under a new rooflight is not sound, it is better replaced as part of the same visit.
Access in the older streets is tight. Terraces open directly onto the pavement or a narrow front step, with an alley at the back that may be shared. A ladder or a compact tower can usually be set up in the yard, though the alley still has to be kept clear. Newer estates are easier, with drives and wider fronts, but gardens often back onto neighbours, so the route for tiles and glass is worked out in advance.
Fitting from inside is possible on many of these roofs, and it helps where the street is tight. The old slates are lifted from within the roof space, the new frame is bedded in, and the covering is made good around it without ever setting a scaffold in the road. We say at the survey which method suits the house, and we keep the loft clear of dust with sheets.
Slate terrace, rear slope
- Narrow, old rafters that may need doubling
- Lead or kit flashing dressed over slates
- Access from the yard or back alley
Estate house, concrete tile
- Regular rafters or trusses to be checked
- Tile-profile flashing kit
- Access from the drive or front garden
Wigan Council, Greater Manchester and the route to a signed-off roof
Wigan Council is the planning authority here, and Golborne lies in Greater Manchester. A house with its own roof can usually settle the planning question before any money is spent. The permitted development conditions, and the points where they stop, are set out in our planning guide for skylights. Flats and maisonettes sit outside those rights, and a listed building needs listed building consent from the council before anything else. Wigan Council holds the local records and Historic England keeps the national list, so a listing is easy to confirm.
We name no conservation area for Golborne here, deliberately: an Article 4 direction can take away the permitted right to fit a rooflight, but conservation area status alone does not. A short conversation with the council tells you whether your road is touched by either. Where a direction applies, how conservation-area rooflights get approved shows the next step.
The certificate an owner receives for each rooflight we fit comes from Wigan Council's building control team; the Building Regulations that apply to roof glazing are covered in detail elsewhere. In an existing home Part L lets a roof window reach 1.4 W/m²K (or Window Energy Rating band B) and a rooflight or lantern 2.2 W/m²K, so the glass is chosen to meet both figures.
A slate terrace loft deserves a note of its own. Plenty of terrace lofts were converted with a stair that falls short of today's rules. On a two-storey house the roof window cannot be the way out either, since the loft floor sits more than 4.5 metres above the ground, beyond the height at which Approved Document B allows an escape window. For a bedroom, the stair is what the council will examine first, and we raise it when we survey, not once the unit is in.
- Is the house a flat or maisonette, which lacks the permitted development rights?
- Is it listed, which means consent before anything else?
- Does an Article 4 direction from the council cover your road?
- Does the loft room need an escape route as well as light?
- Is the opening cut into a truss that needs an engineer's view?
Golborne rooflights: roofs, rules and the road in
Can you fit a rooflight into the slate roof of a Golborne terrace?
We check the slate, the nails and the rafters first, because a slate roof of this age can be brittle and its timbers narrow. The opening is framed, the flashing is dressed over the slates, and the whole detail is built so water runs over it and not behind it.
What suits the flat-roofed kitchen at the back of my Golborne terrace?
On a new upstand, a flat rooflight is the usual choice, or a small lantern where the room is wide enough. The felt around the opening is looked at during the survey, and a roof edge that is close to worn out gets planned into the same visit.
Do you work across Golborne and the streets around it?
We work across all of Golborne, from the older terraces through the mid-century estates to the newest housing, and out towards the neighbouring villages. Send your address by WhatsApp and we will confirm whether it falls inside our area.
The rafters in our colliery terrace look thin. Can they carry a roof window?
Narrow rafters are normal on a terrace of this age, and they rarely rule a window out. Where the opening cuts one, the rafters either side are doubled up and a trimmer carries the load round the window. The survey measures what is actually in the roof before a size is chosen, so the frame never has to be forced to fit.
Does the concrete-tile roof on our 1980s estate house need anything different from a slate one?
The flashing is the main difference: a tile-profile kit replaces the lead dressed over slates. The rafters or trusses are also checked first, because a truss roof carries its load through members that must not be cut without an engineer's view. Concrete tile is cut less awkwardly when the window is sized to the tile courses, so the opening is planned before the first tile is lifted.
Leigh, Haydock and Newton-le-Willows close by
Leigh, Haydock and Newton-le-Willows lie close by, and each has a page covering its own terraces and estates.
Free survey
Get a fixed quote in Golborne
- No obligation
- We survey the roof before we price
- WhatsApp or phone, whichever suits
What happens next: we arrange a survey at a time that suits you, measure the roof and the room, then send a fixed written quote. Nothing is booked until you say yes.