Renovations in Battersea

Two quite different renovation markets share the SW11 postcode. Between Battersea Park and Clapham Junction lie streets of bay fronted Victorian terraces with closet wings and side returns, family houses being adapted for a second or third generation of owners. Along the river, around Battersea Power Station, the stock is apartments in managed blocks with none of the same freedoms. GS Renovation works on both, handling structural openings, extensions, lofts, kitchens and bathrooms, appointing the structural engineer, building to the design issued and coordinating Wandsworth Council building control inspections through to completion.

Terraced houses off Northcote Road

The terraces here follow a pattern that repeats for street after street: two reception rooms divided by a spine wall, a rear closet wing running back alongside a narrow side return, and chimney breasts sitting in the party wall on both floors. The alterations people want are equally consistent, which is opening the ground floor into one space and widening the kitchen into the return. What varies is the state of the masonry taking the beam bearings, and that has to be seen rather than assumed. Two identical looking houses can need quite different bearing details.

We open up the bearing zones before the steel is ordered, and where the brickwork is soft or has been rebuilt badly, we needle through to sound material. Because the beam almost always lands in the wall shared with your neighbour, the work is notifiable under the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 and the duty to serve notice sits with you as the building owner. We prepare the drawings and method information your surveyor needs, and phase demolition so nothing above is ever unsupported. Props sit on sole plates spread across the joists below.

Riverside apartments and managed blocks

A flat near the river operates under a different set of rules. There are no permitted development rights, so any change to a window, a vent or a balcony is a planning matter for Wandsworth Council. The lease will require the freeholder's licence to alter for structural work, moved bathrooms and often for floor finishes, and the managing agent sets working hours, lift bookings and how waste leaves the building. None of that stops a good renovation, but it does have to be sequenced into the programme rather than discovered.

The building work itself is finer than in a terrace. Partitions are usually non structural, so layouts can change more freely, while the slab, the risers and the drainage runs are effectively fixed. Kitchens and bathrooms are planned around where waste can reach the stack at a workable fall, extraction is designed around the ventilation the block already has, and acoustic underlays are chosen to satisfy the lease as well as your own comfort. Notifiable electrical work is certified as part of the job. All of it is agreed with the managing agent before work starts.

Where most Battersea projects start: whole-house refurbishment in Battersea, everything we cover across Wandsworth, renovations in Putney, renovations in Balham and how to plan a renovation.