Woodville, 25 road miles to the south-west of the city centre
Woodville: skylights and rooflights
A big suburban village on the Derbyshire and Leicestershire line, once called Wooden Box and later home to potteries, pipe works and breweries. Most of that industry has gone, and large new estates have been built around it.
It began as a wooden hut on a toll road
Woodville was once known as Wooden Box, after the timber toll booth on the road between Ashby de la Zouch and Burton-upon-Trent. The booth is long gone, and so is most of the industry that followed it, but the main road is still the spine of the village.
Woodville, from the toll road to the new estates
Woodville is a large suburban village and civil parish, 2 miles east of Swadlincote, and its parish straddles two districts: South Derbyshire in Derbyshire, and North West Leicestershire in Leicestershire. The 2011 census gave the parish 5,161 residents, up from 3,420 ten years earlier. We have set out the five things worth knowing before a rooflight goes into a Woodville roof. Our overall approach is explained at skylight installation in Nottingham.
01
A parish in two districts, and which council covers you
For most of Woodville, the local planning authority is South Derbyshire District Council. But the parish crosses the county line, and part of it lies in the North West Leicestershire district. If your house is close to the boundary, the first thing we do is confirm which council actually holds your address.
That matters more than it sounds. The two councils are separate, in different counties, with their own planning officers and their own Building Control arrangements. Your neighbour across the road might be dealing with a different authority from you.
Blackfordby and Swadlincote: the nearest protected areas
No conservation area carries Woodville's own name. The two nearest are Blackfordby, 1.24 km from the village point, designated on 8 September 1992 and holding eight Grade II listed buildings, and Swadlincote, 1.42 km away, designated on 16 August 1990, also with eight Grade II listings. Both belong to neighbouring places. The national list shows 13 entries at a radius of 1.5 km from the centre: a single Grade II* and twelve at Grade II.
South Derbyshire holds the current designations, so your address is checked with the council, and the answer comes before any order.
2districts
South Derbyshire and North West Leicestershire share the parish
13listed
entries Historic England holds in a 1.5 km reach of the centre
Next steps for a rooflight
Your address goes to the right council before anything is ordered, and their answer comes back to you. A listed house needs separate consent for a new roof opening. In a conservation area we also check for an Article 4 direction, which would remove the usual right.
What a house rooflight may and may not do under permitted development is covered in the rooflight planning guide. Notifiable work gets its Building Control filing from us, and the build follows the rules in force.
02
Clay, crates and ropes: the industry under today's streets
The history of Woodville is thick with industry. Potteries, crate-making, pipe works, breweries, rope-making and railways all had a presence here, and today those trades are either gone altogether or much diminished. One example is the Mount Pleasant works of John Knowles and Company, which made pottery and was demolished in 1993. A housing development now stands on the site.
That pattern, factories replaced by homes, tells you something about the roofs. Housing put up near works tends to differ from homes built later on cleared land, and the survey tells us which kind of roof we are dealing with.
Older houses
Age tells us little until we are in the loft. If your house has a steeply pitched roof and a small loft, the survey will measure how much headroom is there, how the rafters are spaced and what the roof covering is. Grey slate is common in industrial-era housing and needs a flashing kit made for it.
When a Woodville roof window has misted or dropped
Some homes already have a roof window from an earlier decade. If the sealed unit has misted, the frame has dropped or the seal has failed, replacement may be possible on the existing opening, which keeps disturbance low. If the surround is rotten, we say so, and the written quote covers the repair. The order on the day is plain: protect the room, strip the old unit and its flashing, renew any damaged timber and felt, set the new frame, then dress lead or a flashing kit over the slate or tile before the lining goes in.
- Batten
- A thin timber strip across the rafters that the slates or tiles hang from.
- Headroom
- The clear height in a loft room, which decides whether a roof window can be reached and opened.
- Surround
- The flashing, trim and timber that meet the edge of a rooflight.
A word on weight
Slate is heavy, and a roof that has carried it for decades has settled into its shape. When cutting an opening we support the surrounding slates and the battens carefully, so nothing slips while the frame goes in.
03
New housing south of the High Street
One large block of Woodville is new. Along the county border to the south of the village, a big community of new homes has been developed, unofficially called Woodville Woodlands, by Bloor Homes and Bryant Homes. Large private estates of new homes have also gone up in the surrounding area, including a district known locally as the Bird district.
New homes bring their own roof questions. Most have trussed roofs, built from factory-made frames that carry the weight of the covering across the full width of the house. A truss cannot be cut through without a plan for supporting the cut, so putting in a rooflight means adding trimmers and checking the load path.
Open-plan living and the middle of the room
Many modern homes have a kitchen and living space running front to back. Patio doors light the garden end, yet the middle of the room is often gloomy in winter. Fitting a long flat unit or a roof lantern above that central stretch alters how the whole space feels.
Stairs and landings
A staircase in a newer house often rises under a pitched roof with no window of its own. A roof window positioned over the stairwell lights the landing and the hall below. Where a roof window will not fit, a sun tunnel does the same job with less structure.
New-build guarantees
If your house is still under a builder warranty, check its terms before altering the roof. We can look at the paperwork on the survey and say what is likely to be affected.
04
The A511, the A514 and a railway that closed in 1964
Out to the south-west, Woodville is 25 road miles from the city centre, a drive of around 35 minutes when traffic behaves. The village has two classified roads nearby, the A511 and the A514. Woodville High Street is part of the A511, with a small shopping area that includes a convenience store, a pharmacy and a fish and chip shop.
Off Hartshorne Road is the site of the old Woodville railway station, which opened in 1851 and linked the village to Swadlincote, Ashby and Burton-upon-Trent. The station closed in 1947 and the line in 1964. Nothing on rails serves the village now, so we arrive by van.
The survey
There is no charge for it. We look first at the room, and where the light fails. Then we go on the roof and read it. The written quote that follows has a fixed price. It does not rise on the day because we found something that could have been seen at the survey.
If your street is busy or your drive is shared, tell us. When we book, we ask how best to bring a ladder and materials to the back of the house.
25road miles
to reach Nottingham centre
35minutes
van time on a normal day
Where else we cover
Woodville is near the edge of our range. We cover everything out to thirty miles by road from Nottingham, and areas we cover shows the places in between.
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1851 | Woodville station opens |
| 1947 | Station closes |
| 1964 | Line closes |
| 1993 | Mount Pleasant works demolished |
05
Green edges, damp air and keeping a rooflight dry
Play areas and woodland close by bring leaves and moisture to the roof.
Woodville is not short of green. Astbury Way Play Area is just 0.4 km from the village point, and Swadlincote Woodlands and Park is 1.4 km away. Trees and open spaces close to housing mean seasonal leaf fall and, in the damp months, a roof that stays wet for longer. Both are worth planning for before the frame goes in, not after the first leak.
Fitting for a wet winter
The weak point in any rooflight is the joint where it meets the roof. We seal and lap that joint to suit the covering. On slate, the flashing is cut to the slate course. On a flat roof, the upstand is raised and the surface is laid to drain away, so puddles cannot sit against the frame.
Condensation inside
The glass of a rooflight is cold in January. Warm moist air from cooking and bathing meets it and turns to droplets. Glazing with a warm-edge spacer holds the inside pane at a kinder temperature. A sash that opens, or a small vent built into the frame, gives that air a way out before it settles.
The guarantee
All our installation work carries a ten-year workmanship guarantee in writing. You can read the wording on the guarantee page before you decide to book.
Getting going
WhatsApp 07880 284133 or fill in the form here, and say which room is dark. Near the county border? Add your postcode and we will pin down the council early.
Woodville: which council, which roof, which rooflight
My house is near the Leicestershire border. Who is my council?
Most of Woodville falls under South Derbyshire District Council, but the parish also reaches into North West Leicestershire. We confirm which council holds your address before ordering anything. If the job is notifiable, we also make the Building Control filing with the right authority.
Our house is new. Can a rooflight be fitted in a trussed roof?
Yes, with extra support. Trusses cannot be cut freely, so trimmers are added around the opening to carry the load. We check the roof from inside the loft on the survey and include any extra timber in the fixed quote. If a builder warranty applies, we suggest you read its terms first.
Our stairs have no window and it is dark all winter. What helps?
A roof window over the stairwell is the strongest option when the stair sits under a slope. Where it does not, a sun tunnel carries light from a roof dome to a ceiling diffuser. We look at both on the survey and tell you which suits the roof you have.
Do you replace old rooflights as well as fitting new ones?
Yes. A misted or leaking unit can often come out and a new one go into the same hole, which keeps the work tidy. If the surround has failed, we tell you at the survey and the quote covers the repair. The workmanship carries our ten-year written guarantee.