Flat rooflight on the roof of a brick rear extension between terraces

Heage

Fitting skylights and rooflights in Heage's village bedrooms

9.8 road miles north of Derby, near the old Morley Park furnaces.

Heage is an Amber Valley village. Name the bedroom that needs more sky and we start there.

Book a free survey

Bedrooms in the roof, short on sky

Sitting room with a sofa and coffee table by a garden window — A sitting room with a sofa and coffee table, dim away from the one garden window.

Tiled room lit by a round sun tunnel diffuser — A tiled room with a round sun tunnel diffuser overhead, and little daylight otherwise.

Choosing a rooflight for a Heage bedroom

Under a roof, the working choice is a roof window in VELUX or a similar make, with conservation rooflights for older roofs, energy efficient rooflights for a warm night and sun tunnels for a landing outside.

A bedroom has needs that a kitchen or a hall does not. It must be dark when you want it dark, warm in winter, cool in summer and, when it sits in the roof, safe to leave in an emergency. Those four points shape how we pick glass, blinds and the opening style. The same survey also covers the stairs and landing outside the door, because a bedroom window that lights the room and leaves the landing black solves half of the problem.

The full guide

A Heage bedroom under the roof

Heage is a village of about 2,600 people in Amber Valley. This guide begins at the side of the bed, because that is where a bedroom's daylight is judged, and works up through the roof to the rules that apply to a room people sleep in.

Bedside
Older coverings
Escape and height
Borough rules

Callout 1

Judging a bedroom from the pillow

The best test for a bedroom window is to lie in bed and look up. You want sky, a feeling of space and enough morning light to wake by, but you do not want to be woken by the dawn glare of midsummer. That mixture of wishes is why a bedroom takes planning.

Planning a roof bedroom window

Mark the bed
We note where the bed, wardrobe and door sit before any window is drawn.
Pick glass and blinds
Solar coating, blackout blind and insect screen are decided together.
Check the exit
The window size is tested against escape requirements for the storey.
Agree one figure
One written figure, with the unit and its sizes named.
Open, fit, line
The slope is opened, the unit is set in and the well is finished.

Position comes first. Set the roof window nearer the foot end and daylight runs across the covers and lets you see weather from the pillow. A window above the head of the bed can throw glare directly into your face. Over a reading chair, it makes a lovely corner. Where the bed has to sit under the lowest part of the slope, the window moves up or to one side.

Darkening is the second consideration. A blind that slides in tracks shuts the whole window, and an insect screen allows the sash to stay open on a warm night. Both are available for current roof windows, though the older the unit, the more likely it is that fittings must be matched to its make.

Third is temperature. A loft bedroom collects heat from the roof in summer, so glass with a solar coating and a blind on the outside make a measurable difference. Our survey notes which way the slope faces so the glazing is chosen for that. A slope facing north gives steady, cool light that suits a bedroom well, while a slope facing south or west sends in a lot more heat late in the day and needs the coated glass and the outside blind far more. We tell you plainly which case you are in, and we do not suggest extras that the orientation does not call for.

Lie on the bed, look up, and note where the sun would strike your face.

Callout 2

Slate, tile and an older roofline

Heage has its own piece of industrial history in the remains of two coke-fired blast furnaces at Morley Park, built to smelt iron, which can still be seen beside the A38. What that tells a surveyor is only that the village has a working past. The houses are what matter, and a roof cannot be assumed before it has been looked at.

Where a roof is old, with a natural covering and a ridge line people care about, a conservation rooflight is the better fit. It has a slim metal frame with one central glazing bar, and it stands low against the covering. From the lane it looks like a small, plain gap in the roof, not a modern window sticking out of it.

The covering underneath decides the detail. Slate is thin and layered, clay tiles have their own curves, and concrete tiles are heavier and need a different flashing. A conservation rooflight can be built into any of them, but the flashing must be cut for that covering.

Timber condition is the last thing we check. Where a rafter around the opening shows signs of decay or old insect damage, the opening is moved or the timber strengthened before the frame is fitted. That sort of finding is better made in the survey than on the roof with the covering already lifted, which is why we go into the loft before we write a figure.

A conservation rooflight, part by part

Frame: slim metal, low profile
Glazing bar: single central bar
Glass: double glazed, sealed unit
Flashing: cut to the roof covering
Fixing: into new rafter trimmers

Callout 3

A bedroom in the roof has to be safe

Somebody has to be able to leave a bedroom fast if the worst happens, so a window in a sleeping room carries obligations that a kitchen rooflight never meets. The authority on this is Approved Document B, and our survey puts your room through it before any window is picked.

Everything hangs on how far the room sits above ground level. A bungalow or chalet bungalow usually keeps its roof rooms close enough for a roof window to count as a way out. Raise the room up a second storey and the answer flips, because a loft conversion above two floors needs a protected stair, and no window can be swapped in for one.

Size is the other test. The sash, once open, must leave a clear gap of generous proportions, and the table gives the exact figures. They set a floor under the window we can offer and under how far the sash has to swing.

Ask us for the room measurements in writing if you want to see how the sums come out. It is a short list, and it is the reason we ask about ceiling heights and the position of the stair at the very start, long before a unit is ordered. Getting those two answers early saves a redesign later.

The bedroom window checklist

What we test before a roof bedroom window is chosen.
Check	Requirement	Applies to
Height above ground	within 4.5 m	escape window
Clear opening area	0.33 m² or more	escape window
Narrowest clear dimension	450 mm	escape window
Loft over two floors	protected stair	conversions
Bungalow or chalet	roof window may serve	rooms in roof

Callout 4

Amber Valley Borough Council and the paperwork

For Heage, Amber Valley Borough Council is the body that answers planning questions. On an ordinary house, rooflights commonly fall within permitted development, and every condition is gathered in our planning guide. Read them there, then speak to the council if your home is anything other than a standard house.

Flats and maisonettes fall outside what a householder may do. A listed building wants consent first. Whether a conservation area covers your street in Heage is a question for Amber Valley Borough Council, and a short call will settle it. Where an Article 4 direction applies, permitted development can be withdrawn.

Building work has its own sign-off. A new roof opening goes on record with the council or with a registered building control approver, and our team makes that notification. A like-for-like swap is held to the Part L energy limits, The limits in W/m²K run at 1.4 across roof windows and 2.2 across rooflights.

Having this settled before the scaffold goes up matters for a bedroom in particular, because you will want the room back in use quickly. We list each approval on the quote, with a note of who applies for it, so there is no confusion over who is chasing what once the work is under way.

Heage's roofs and what they allow

Heage is a village and a former civil parish, now part of the parish of Ripley, in the Amber Valley district. It began as a chapelry of Duffield and later became a civil parish of its own. Its industrial remains at Morley Park are a local landmark, and they sit close to the A38.

The useful question is how the type of house responds to a rooflight, not how old it is.

Bungalows and chalets suit this kind of window naturally. The rooms in the roof usually sit within escape height and the benefits are immediate. A bedroom gets a view of sky, and a study gets daylight over the desk.

Where a two-storey house already has a loft bedroom, the check is different. The window has to serve light and fresh air, and the stair arrangement is looked at on its own. A loft that has not yet been converted may need more than a window, and we explain that at the survey.

If yours is an older cottage-style house with a natural covering, the conservation rooflight and care over the slope are the answer. If it is a recent house with trussed rafters, the opening has to be designed round them.

Whichever applies, the order stays the same. You show us the bed, the landing or the work surface, and the roof is read from there.

One more practical point concerns the landing outside the bedroom door. A roof window in the bedroom does nothing for the stairwell, so if the stair is gloomy we price a sun tunnel or a second small window in the same visit and show the two together on the quote. That keeps the sums honest and lets you decide whether to do one job or both.

Heage bedroom and roof queries

Does a loft bedroom window mean a dazzling early start?

Only if nobody plans for it. Fit a blind that slides in tracks down each side and the glass goes fully dark, and the window need not sit over the head of the bed. We ask which way the slope faces at the survey, because that decides how much early sun comes in.

Can a Heage bungalow's roof window double as the way out of a bedroom?

Yes, when the room is low enough and the sash opens wide enough. The checklist table earlier on this page gives the height and the minimum clear opening. During the survey we measure your room against both, and size the window so it clears them with room to spare.

I want a loft bedroom in a two-storey house. Is a roof window enough?

Not as a way out. A loft conversion above two floors needs a protected stair, and no roof window replaces one. The window still counts for daylight and fresh air, and the survey is the time to talk through where the stair could go and what the layout allows.

Do conservation rooflights suit old stone roofs?

They are designed for sensitive roofs. The slim frame and low profile sit close to the covering. The flashing is cut to suit stone, slate or tile, and the position is chosen to keep the roofline looking balanced from the road.

Is the survey free?

Yes. We come out, stand in the bedroom, climb into the loft and only then write the quote. Nothing is priced until the roof has been seen. The figure on the written quote is fixed, and the day of the work brings no extras.

Nearby

Book your free survey

Where do you want the light? Tell us in the form: the worktop, the stair, the desk.

No obligation. We survey before we price.
We cover Derby and 30 miles around.