Kitchen Extensions Bow

Most houses in Bow are terraces: 18% of homes in Bow are terraced houses and only 1% are semi-detached or detached, while 81% are flats. A house kitchen extension here is therefore a terrace job, often on the Victorian streets around Roman Road, and means a side return infill or a single storey rear addition, with the steel, drainage and glazing planned before the cabinets. We build the shell and fit the kitchen in one programme, working to the drawings and any consent you or your designer hold.

In Bow, a rear kitchen extension of about 30 square metres typically costs £45,000 to £97,500 excluding VAT, or £60,000 to £100,000 for a side return (indicative London ranges, Resi, MyBuilder and Checkatrade, 2026). GS Renovation Ltd, a building contractor based in Potters Bar, does the work in Bow: the structural engineer we appoint designs the foundations and steel, we build the room and fit the kitchen, and a registered electrician certifies the electrics.

Which kitchen extension a Bow terrace can take

The usual choice on a Bow terrace is a side return infill, a rear addition, or both joined as a wraparound behind the back reception. Where the house has a narrow rear wing with a passage alongside it, filling that passage is what turns a galley kitchen into a room wide enough for an island. On a house that is not detached, national permitted development allows a single storey rear extension up to three metres beyond the original rear wall, and no more than four metres high.

Check the word original before you measure. A rear wing built with the house is part of the original house, but a later addition by a past owner counts against that three metre allowance, so the depth left without an application may be less than the garden suggests. Where you want more, prior approval can take a house that is not detached to six metres, but only outside designated land such as a conservation area. All of this assumes the house still has its permitted development rights. We set out the footprint on site against the drawings before we dig.

Housing in Bow

Count the homes in Bow and you get about 15,000: 75% built since 1945, 2% between the wars and 23% before 1919, with flats at 81% and houses at 19%. Most homes here are flats, and only a ground floor flat in Bow with its own garden can extend its kitchen.

Tredegar Square and conservation area rules change the route

If your house sits in a conservation area, a side infill needs householder planning permission, because permitted development gives side extensions no cover on designated land. The council's appraisal says the Tredegar Square Conservation Area straddles Mile End and Bow, and there are 58 conservation areas in Tower Hamlets, each with its own appraisal and management guidelines. Read the one for your street before the design is fixed, as it can say what the council values about rear elevations as well as fronts.

The Tredegar Square management plan is useful for kitchen work in Bow. It says the scope for rear extensions to be altered is often greater than for roof extensions, and that an extension should always be subordinate to the main building. In practice that points to a roof line kept below the main house and brick or glazing that reads as an addition. We price the shell from the approved elevations, so the materials the officer agreed are the ones that arrive on site.

Steel, the new opening and building control in Bow

Joining the extension to the house means taking out part of the rear wall, and in a Bow terrace that wall carries the floor and often the rear wall of the room above. The structural engineer we appoint sizes the beam and its padstones, and we install it with the floor propped before any brickwork is removed. Tower Hamlets Council treats a structural opening into a new extension as part of the extension for its building control charge, so it is not charged separately. Steel bearing into the party wall, or foundations close to the neighbour, usually brings in the Party Wall etc. Act, and the building owner serves those notices.

Building regulations approval is needed for the extension and for the change to the structure, whichever planning route applies. Where the council is your building control body, a commencement notice has to reach Tower Hamlets Council at least two working days before work starts, so we set the start date around it. The council inspects at the start, at stages during the job and at the end, and generally visits the same day if an inspection is requested by phone before 10am, Monday to Friday. That keeps a foundation or steel stage from sitting open.

Drainage, glazing and flood checks for a Bow kitchen

Drainage is surveyed before the design is final, because a kitchen extension often covers the ground where the rear drain run and gully sit. A shared run under a terrace may need a build over agreement with the water company, and a new sink on an island needs a fall back to the stack. Roof lights and a glazed rear wall bring light into the middle of the house, and their position is set before the steel so the beam does not land where the glass should be.

Check your address on the Environment Agency flood map before any application is drawn up. Tower Hamlets Council's householder checklist asks for a Flood Risk Assessment with an application for a ground floor extension in Flood Zone 2 or 3. So it only arises where the extension needs planning permission and the house is in one of those zones. The assessment can set floor levels and the threshold at the garden doors, and we build to the levels it fixes rather than to the level of the old kitchen floor.

• Hob gas supply altered by a Gas Safe registered engineer
• Boiler relocation and flue changes on the enclosed rear wall
• Drain diversions and build over agreements with the water company

VOA Council Tax stock of properties, March 2025, for Bow North & Fish Island, Bow West and Bow South. Counts rounded by the VOA.

Next steps that tend to follow kitchen extensions in Bow: kitchen renovation in Bow, kitchen extensions across Tower Hamlets, a side return kitchen infill, sign-off by building control on a kitchen extension, kitchen extensions anywhere in London and Underfloor Heating Costs.

Why Choose GS Renovation in Bow

We take a kitchen extension from the opening up of the rear wall to the last cabinet door, so one team is responsible for the shell and the room inside it. You or your designer hold the consent, and we build to it, give you the programme and keep building control's stage inspections in the sequence. The structural engineer we appoint sizes the steel, a registered electrician certifies the new circuits and a registered gas engineer moves any gas supply, all within our programme. You deal with one site lead from strip out to handover.

• Old kitchen kept in use until the new shell is weathertight
• Building control and Part P certificates handed over together at the end
• Materials priced at options, so you choose the finish

Checked by Abdelaaziz Saaid, founder and director of GS Renovation Ltd (Companies House no. 14611254). Structural design is by the consulting engineer appointed to your project.