Pyramid roof lantern on a brick extension with trees behind

Ilkeston

Ilkeston bedrooms and landings lit by rooflights and skylights

10.8 road miles north-east of Derby; the town stands on the River Erewash.

Waking up in a dim bedroom, or stepping onto a landing with no window? Tell us which spot bothers you and the rooflight is planned from that point.

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Bedrooms under the slope and stairs with no daylight of their own

Small bedroom under a sash window in the gable — A small bedroom under a gable sash window, dim away from the glass.

A stair that turns away from every window in the house.

Choosing a rooflight for an Ilkeston bedroom or landing

Where a street wants a low profile, conservation rooflights are the neat choice; a bedroom under the rafters suits a VELUX unit or a roof window from another maker; a landing beneath a loft calls for a sun tunnel; and a sunny aspect is worth pairing with energy efficient rooflights.

A bedroom asks different things of a rooflight than a kitchen does. Nobody needs a bright glare at breakfast over the bed, but waking to soft daylight is a different matter, and so is a ceiling that does not trap warm air on a summer night. The first job is always to see which kind sits above your bed, how steep it is, and what lies between the slates or tiles and the ceiling. Then the size, the glass and the blind are chosen to suit sleeping, not just lighting.

The full guide

Ilkeston, one bedroom at a time

Sleep is the one activity that wants both daylight and darkness from the same hole in the roof. Here is how the bed, the glass and the rules fit around that demand in an Ilkeston house.

Bed position
Low-profile units
Sleep and glare
Warm lining

Callout 1

Deciding where the glass sits over the bed

In a bedroom the spot is a pair of places, the bed and the route to the door. A rooflight that lights only the pillow can leave the wardrobe in shadow, while one that lights the floor space brightens the room but may shine straight on your face at dawn. The best position depends on which of those matters more to you, and on where the rafters allow an opening.

Four places for the glass in a bedroom

Where the unit can sit and what that means for the sleeper.
Position	Daylight on	Consider
Over the bed head	Pillow end, walls	Dawn light on the face
Over the bed foot	Floor and wardrobe	Gentler wake-up
Beside the bed	Walkway, dressing area	Rafter spacing decides
Over the stair head	Landing and door	Good for shared spaces

On the visit we begin at the head of the bed, move to the foot, and look up each time. We mark both on the plan and check the loft above. Sometimes a clear bay lies exactly where we want it. Sometimes a purlin or a chimney breast sits in the way, and we move the opening sideways to the nearest sound position. A unit set above the bed foot lights the room without pointing at your eyes in the morning.

Sloping ceilings add a further point. Under a slope, the wall space is limited, and the daylight from the rooflight is what makes the low side of the room usable. A bed pushed under the eaves with a rooflight above the walking space feels very different from one with no light at all.

Think about how you use the room before you think about the glass. Do you read in bed, dress by the window, work at a small desk in the corner? Each habit points to a different place for the opening, and it is much easier to decide with a floor plan in front of you than from the middle of the room. The table lays out the choices.

The bed and the way to the door are two spots, and the glass has to serve both.

Callout 2

When a street wants a slimmer rooflight

Ilkeston lies in the Borough of Erewash, and planning here is a matter for Erewash Borough Council, which keeps its own guidance online at erewash.gov.uk. The record we hold names no conservation area for the town, so none appears here. The council's own pages are the authority, and the question is settled house by house.

Pictured here is a conservation rooflight, a slim metal frame with a single glazing bar down the middle, sitting low against the covering. It is the unit to ask about if the council says your street needs a gentler profile or if your house is listed. It is also a good choice anywhere a front slope faces the road and you would rather the roofline stayed calm.

On an ordinary house in an ordinary street, rooflights generally come within permitted development, though conditions apply, and flats are treated separately. We point to the planning guide for the conditions instead of recopying them. If a direction removes the usual freedoms, you will need the council's approval before work starts.

A bedroom in the roof raises the escape question as well. Approved Document B restricts a roof window's use as the way out to rooms sitting 4.5 m up at the most. In addition, the opening itself must meet a minimum clear size set out in that document. Above that height, as with a loft over two full storeys, a protected stair does the job. Your plan is tested against this before a bedroom is promised.

Callout 3

Glass and blinds for a room you sleep in

A rooflight pours in more light than a wall window of the same size, because it faces the open sky. That is a help at a desk and a hindrance at five in the morning in June. The answer is partly in the glass and partly in the blind.

A blackout blind runs on side rails so no light leaks round the edges, and it is the practical way to turn the daylight off. It is also the cheaper route in time and fuss. A glass with a solar-control coating cuts the heat as well as the glare, which matters on a south-facing slope that bakes a bedroom in summer. The compare panel sets the two ideas side by side, and many bedrooms end up with a bit of both.

Noise is a smaller point but a real one. Rain on glass is louder than rain on a tile roof. Laminated glazing, which has a plastic interlayer, softens the drumming, and it is worth raising when the bed sits right beneath the opening.

Dimming the daylight: blind or glass

Blackout blind on rails

Darkens the room fully
Easy to open and close
Does not stop heat arriving

Solar-control glazing

Cuts heat and glare
Fixed, always working
Room stays lighter by day

Callout 4

The lining above the bed

The light well in a bedroom is the part you lie under, so it should be neat and warm. Dust, a draught or a cold surface above the pillow are the things people notice first, long before they notice the glass. Its sides are boarded and insulated and its inside surface is painted pale so the daylight spreads. Insulation runs without a gap from the roof to the ceiling, since a cold edge above a bed is where breath moisture settles.

Where wiring is needed, say for a powered blind or a motorised vent, it is run before the lining closes. The edge between ceiling and light well gets a clean line, and the room is left tidy each evening of the job.

A town between two cities, and its changing industry

Ilkeston is a town of about 39,000 people on the River Erewash, between Derby and Nottingham and close to the M1. It was shaped by heavy industry. Coal mining, iron working and lace-making or textiles were its major trades, and they have now all but disappeared. One of the largest local employers was the Stanton Ironworks, later known as Stanton and Staveley, which continued a long tradition of iron. There is evidence of iron working and quarrying here since Roman times, and the industry grew into a huge concern from the 1780s. By the middle of the nineteenth century there were several blast furnaces, with production rising from around 500 tons of pig iron a month to 7,000 by the end of the century. Steel pipe manufacture began at Stanton after the First World War.

The railways tell a similar story of change. Ilkeston once had three stations. Ilkeston Junction closed in the 1960s, Ilkeston Town closed to passengers in 1947, and Ilkeston North closed in 1964. For fifty years there was no station at all, despite a large population and the Erewash Valley Line running past. A new Ilkeston station opened, with two platforms and automated ticket machines, and it is unstaffed.

What this means for a roof is partly guesswork, and we do not dress it up as certainty. A town built on mining and ironworks grew in waves, so its housing carries different ages. Some of it will be older terraced and semi-detached stock, some later estates, and some conversions of buildings that had other uses. The survey takes each house as it comes. In older roofs the timbers may not be regular, and we fit the opening around what is there. In later roofs the trussed rafters limit where the frame can go, and the structure is trimmed round the opening.

The thread through all of it is the bedroom and the landing. These are the rooms that are often tucked under the slope or deep in the plan, and where a single rooflight changes how the day starts. Where the landing sits beneath a loft used for storage, a sun tunnel may need less room than a full light well.

Surveys are free, quotes are fixed and in writing, and we back the work with a 10-year workmanship guarantee, in writing. To begin, fill in the survey form.

Ilkeston bedroom and landing questions

Will daylight from above wake me at dawn?

Not if the blind is chosen with the glass. A blackout blind on side rails darkens the room fully, and solar-control glazing takes the heat out of the sun. Putting the glass above the bed foot also keeps dawn light off your face, and the choices are laid out during the visit.

Who decides on a slim rooflight for an Ilkeston street?

Erewash Borough Council handles planning. The council's own pages are the place to check a particular street, since no conservation area is named here. If the house is listed, a separate consent applies. We look into your address before the visit and tell you what we find.

Can the roof window be my way out in an emergency?

Only while the sleeping level stays low enough. The rules cap the height at 4.5 m, and they set a minimum clear opening as well. When a loft stands over two complete floors, a protected stair takes over as the way out. Every roof bedroom gets this check.

Does rain sound loud on a bedroom rooflight?

Rain on glass can be louder than on tiles. Laminated glazing, which uses a plastic interlayer, softens the sound noticeably. For a light sleeper whose bed is right beneath the glass, it goes in the quote as an option, so you can decide.

Can you replace an old rooflight that has misted up?

Yes. A misted unit has lost its seal and will not clear, so the whole sealed glass or the entire window is replaced. The new unit has to meet current energy limits. See our page on misted rooflight replacement for what is involved.

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

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We cover Derby and 30 miles around.