GS Renovation opens St Albans houses into single connected spaces, taking out internal walls and replacing them with designed structural support. Terraced and postwar stock here was built as small separate rooms, so joining them is a structural project rather than a decorative one. We appoint the structural engineer and coordinate the inspections.
The St Albans layouts that suit opening up
Terraced houses and postwar estate housing are the layouts an open plan conversion suits, and St Albans has concentrations of both. Terraced houses account for 880 of the 2,840 dwellings in the Camp and Cunningham area, 31.0 per cent of that area's stock. In Townsend and New Greens, 1,080 of 3,070 dwellings, 35.2 per cent, were built between 1945 and 1954.
Both forms were built with the kitchen shut off from the rear reception room by a wall that is part of the structure. Opening that through is a beam job. The engineer we appoint works out what the wall carries, sizes the steel and designs the bearings at each end. We prop, cut in stages, and seat the beam before the props come out.
Interwar semis need the same treatment
1930s semi detached houses are the other form suited to opening up, and two St Albans areas record heavy 1930s stock. In Bernards Heath, 740 dwellings, 28.2 per cent of that area's stock, were built between 1930 and 1939. In the Longacres area, 740 of 2,560 dwellings, 28.9 per cent, were built in the same decade.
In a 1930s semi the wall between the two reception rooms can also carry a chimney breast above it, so the beam picks up more than the floor. Where a new beam bears into a party wall, the party wall route applies and notices are served before work starts. We are contractors, not party wall surveyors, so where a surveyor is needed we say so rather than working outside our scope.
The inspection stages an open plan job passes through
St Albans building control inspects at set stages: commencement, foundations excavated, damp proof course or tanking, oversite, drains laid, floor joists, steelwork, roof carcass, insulation, windows and completion. An internal open plan conversion will not touch every one of those, but it will touch steelwork, and it will touch completion.
Steelwork is listed in its own right, after floor joists and before roof carcass. That is the stage that governs the programme, because the beam and its bearings have to be visible when the surveyor attends. We sequence the making good behind that visit, so nothing is boarded, boxed or plastered over a bearing that has not been seen.
- Utility and boot room space carved out of the new layout
- Knock-throughs between front and rear reception rooms
- Zoned lighting circuits and dimming for a multi-use room
- Rooflights and glazed roofs to bring light deep into the plan
- Bi-fold and sliding door openings onto the garden
Why Choose GS Renovation in St Albans
St Albans open plan work starts from terraced and postwar layouts built as separate small rooms, so the value is in establishing what the dividing wall carries before it is touched. We appoint the structural engineer, build to the calculations, and hold the making good back until the steelwork stage has been inspected. Fully insured, building control applications and inspections coordinated, free no obligation quotations and one point of contact.
- Itemised pricing, so you can see what every stage costs
- Lighting circuits zoned rather than one pendant in the middle
- Free, no-obligation quotations
- Structural engineer instructed and coordinated on your behalf
- Cooking smells and extraction planned into an open kitchen
- Materials priced at options, so you choose the finish