Due south of the city, 23.2 miles by road
Skylights & rooflights in Thurmaston
A Leicestershire village on the east bank of the Soar, split in two by a dual carriageway and edged by lakes. Roofs here sit under wide, open skies, and they take what the weather off the river sends them.
A village with boats on its doorstep
Two marinas sit on the east bank of the Soar here, one of them a boat-yard, with moorings strung along the water. With the river, a canal and several lakes close by, a roof here needs to cope with damp air.
Thurmaston, from the Soar upward
Thurmaston is a civil parish and village in Leicestershire, within Charnwood borough, with a recorded population of 9,509. It lies a few miles north of Leicester, and it is one of the longer drives in our area. That makes planning the visit matter, and it makes the local setting worth reading before a rooflight is chosen. Our wider work is described at skylight installation in Nottingham.
01
Beside the Soar: water, wind and an open skyline
What a river-edge village means for a roof in a wet winter.
Thurmaston lies on the eastern bank of the River Soar. The map lists, inside 1.5 km of the village point, the river itself, the Grand Union Canal and a scatter of lakes: Keys Lake, Trilakes, Horseshoe Lake, Jelsons Lake, Murphys Lake and Meadow Pool. The village is bounded to the west by Watermead Country Park, to the north by Syston and to the east by Barkby and Barkby Thorpe.
Green space is close too. Elizabeth Park is about 0.3 km from the centre, Watermead Country Park about 0.9 km and Jesse Jackson Park about 1.3 km. Birstall Nature Reserve is 0.7 km away, with the Reedbed Nature Reserve at 1.7 km and the Syston Lake Nature Spot at 2.4 km.
Damp air, cold glass
With this much water about, winter air carries moisture, and it lands first on the glass, the coldest thing in the room. Warm-edge spacers and a sound glazing unit hold the inner pane nearer room temperature. Steam from the bathroom or kitchen needs a way out too: an opening rooflight or a vent in the frame provides it.
Wind across open ground
Open water and parkland leave less to shelter a roof. Driven rain hits an exposed tiled slope harder, so we pair the roof window flashing with the covering and check what lies under it. Flat roofs get an upstand tall enough to hold water off the seal, and a finish that falls away.
02
A village cut in two by the A607
23.2miles
of driving from the city centre
32minutes
at the wheel, clear roads
One feature shapes Thurmaston more than any other. The A607 dual carriageway splits the village in two, and it bypasses the main village. It is the only classified road recorded near the middle of the village. Roads like that matter to a roofer in a practical way: which side of the road you are on affects where we can park the van and how we reach the back of the house.
Getting to you
The road distance is 23.2 miles, heading south, and the drive takes around 32 minutes. It is a long way out. We therefore treat the survey as the main event, not a courtesy call: we look at the room first, then the roof and the routes water takes, and we leave with every measurement we need. Syston station, about 2 km away on the map, is open, but we arrive by van. If your home is near the dual carriageway, tell us which side, because it changes the route we take to your door.
Telling us the details
In your message, say how to reach the back of the house, whether a driveway exists, and whether the roof is visible from the garden. A short list helps us bring the right ladders and plan the day around your property rather than a guess.
Just outside Leicester
The village sits four miles north of Leicester, just outside the A563 outer ring road. It is on the edge of a larger place, and its position on the edge of Leicester has brought much development. Nearby is Rushey Mead, a suburb about 1.7 km from the village point, which we also cover. Neighbouring towns within 30 road miles are listed under areas we cover.
Because the dual carriageway divides the village, tell us which side of it you live on as well as the street name.
03
Charnwood Borough Council and four listed buildings
Thurmaston is in the borough of Charnwood, so your local planning authority is Charnwood Borough Council. Before a rooflight is ordered, we take your address to them.
Birstall's boundary and Thurmaston's listed buildings
Historic England's list has four buildings in the 1.5 km round the village point: one Grade II* and three Grade II. The only conservation area in the national planning data near the centre is Birstall, 1.42 km away, which holds six Grade II listed buildings. As its name suggests, it probably belongs to the neighbouring settlement rather than Thurmaston itself, so we treat it as a reason to check, not a ruling on your street.
Your own address is what counts. A listed house needs formal consent for a roof opening, and in a conservation area an Article 4 direction can remove the usual freedoms, in which case the road-facing slope gets a second look. Charnwood settles both questions before we order a thing.
4listed
listed buildings near the village point
1.42km
to the nearest recorded conservation area (Birstall)
Thurmaston's share of the process
The national rules for cutting a new rooflight, permitted development and Building Regulations, do not change at the village boundary. They are kept in planning permission for rooflights. Thurmaston's share is local: the council, the slope, and whether notification applies.
If it does, we send the Building Control notification ourselves, and the completion certificate from building control follows the fitting; the work meets the regulations now in force.
04
Roofs on the edge of a growing city
Thurmaston sits on the edge of Leicester, and it is a place that has seen much development over time. A place on the edge of a city holds houses from several periods, so no single roof type can be assumed: we read each roof on the survey.
That is not a weakness. Wherever houses of different ages stand side by side, each roof has its own build. An older roof is more likely to have cut rafters at uneven spacing. A newer one is more likely to be made of engineered trusses that cannot simply be sawn through. Which one you have is settled before any price is given. If we find trusses, we explain what extra framing the opening needs and what it adds to the work, so the figure you see in writing already includes it.
What we look at inside
The best rooflight positions come from the room, not the roof. We stand where you sit, find where the light fades, and note the ceiling height. A long extension that runs back from the kitchen is the commonest case, because the end by the hall is always the dimmest. A rooflight over that end lights the part the back window cannot reach.
- Truss
- A factory-built timber frame that carries the roof and cannot be sawn through like one rafter.
- Upstand
- The kerb a flat-roof rooflight is mounted on.
- Warm-edge spacer
- The bar at the edge between the panes, built to keep cold from creeping in at the rim.
Why a wide view helps
With open ground and water around, the sky above is often wide. That works in favour of a rooflight, because a larger share of cloud brightness reaches the room. The question then becomes glare and heat in the brighter months, and we talk through blinds and glazing options at the survey so there are no surprises in July.
Condensation and cleaning, seen from indoors
Look at the glass on a cold morning. If it runs with water, the cause is usually warm, damp air meeting a cold surface, and the answer starts with the glazing and the frame, not a cloth. We check the lining around the opening, because a neat splayed lining lets warm air wash across the glass. For cleaning, a position within reach of the landing means the inside face can be wiped weekly in the grey months, which keeps the room brighter than any amount of ladder work on the outside.
05
What we would expect to fit in Thurmaston
With roofs of mixed ages, we work from the room, and a few products come up often.
Over a long kitchen or garden room
Where a rear extension reaches into the garden, a roof lantern lifts the ceiling and draws light in from several sides. It reads bright under cloud, which suits the long grey spell between October and March. The timber-framed lantern in our photo below shows what a kitchen extension looks like with one fitted.
In a loft bedroom or a landing room
A roof window in a steep slope gives a view out and an opening for air. It changes how a loft room feels in the dark months.
For a hallway or internal room
A sun tunnel carries the light of a roof dome along a mirrored tube and out at the ceiling beneath, and leaves the roof largely alone.
A misted unit on the old opening
A misted unit may be swapped on the old opening, which is the neater route. In both cases we give a written ten year workmanship guarantee, with a fixed quote after the free survey.
Choosing between them
The room picks the product. If the dark room is a kitchen with its own flat roof, the lantern or a flat rooflight leads. If it sits under the main pitch, a roof window on the right slope is simpler and cheaper to build. If the room is a landing with a loft above it, the sun tunnel may do the job with the least disturbance. The survey decides, and you hear the reasoning, not just the price.
On the Soar side of our area: your questions
Is Thurmaston too far out for a survey?
No. At 23.2 road miles from Nottingham, Thurmaston falls within our 30 mile limit. The survey itself costs you nothing, whatever the job, and the quote you receive afterwards is fixed in writing. We plan around you and bring what is needed to measure the room and roof.
Is Charnwood the council for a rooflight in Thurmaston?
Yes. Planning for Thurmaston sits with Charnwood Borough Council. Most house rooflights need no planning application, though a flat, a listed building or an Article 4 direction would change the answer. We put your address to Charnwood before ordering and make any Building Control notification needed.
Will a rooflight make my kitchen colder in winter?
It need not. Glass loses heat faster than a solid roof, so the glazing unit matters. A modern double-glazed unit with warm-edge spacers loses far less than a tired old one. We talk through the glazing at the survey and show how it affects condensation as well as warmth.
Our rooflight leaks only in heavy rain. What should we do?
Often the fault is at the flashing or the upstand rather than the glass. We look at the seal, the covering around the opening and how water leaves the roof. Depending on what we find, the answer may be a new flashing or a whole new unit, and the survey tells us which.