Building work in Hammersmith: area guide

This is our area guide to building work in Hammersmith (W6, Hammersmith and Fulham): the housing, the council rules that apply (Hammersmith and Fulham Council for planning) and every service we offer here. For whole-house refurbishment go to Home renovation in Hammersmith.

Most W6 homes are flats, on VOA figures, and most work here happens with people still living in them. The terraces running back from Hammersmith Broadway towards Ravenscourt Park and down towards Furnivall Gardens are period properties bought and improved in stages rather than gutted in one go. In a flat, the freeholder's consent and the shared soil stack come before any layout. Either way the job runs around you: dust control, a working kitchen for as long as possible, and a sequence that keeps a bathroom available. One point of contact, a written programme, and a 4.9 rating from 31 reviews on MyBuilder.

Of the 15,040 homes the valuation list records in Hammersmith, 56% were built before 1919, 9% between the wars and 34% since 1945; 77% are flats and 23% are houses. VOA Council Tax stock of properties, March 2025, for Hammersmith Broadway, Brook Green, Ravenscourt Park North and Ravenscourt Park South. Counts rounded by the VOA.

Renovating around the people in it sets the room order

Phasing is the whole art when the home stays occupied. We separate live areas from the works with proper dust screens rather than a sheet taped to a doorframe, run extraction where cutting happens, and keep a route to the front door that does not cross the site. The kitchen renovation is usually the pinch point, so a temporary sink and power go somewhere sensible before the old one comes out. The bathroom renovation follows, and where there is only one, it is compressed into the shortest run with fittings on site beforehand. In a flat both rooms sit on the shared stack, so moving either usually needs the freeholder's consent.

The other half is knowing what will surface. In a W6 terrace it is generally the same short list: an overloaded consumer unit, plumbing extended rather than replaced, floorboards notched to weakness under old pipe runs, and a rear closet wing that runs cold because it is single skin. Notched joists are a structural alteration repair, and a cold wing is sometimes better rebuilt as a house extension job than lined. Finding these in week one, not week six, keeps a programme honest, so we open up and survey before a written price, not off a walk through.

Parking and deliveries near the Broadway, steel through the hallway

Hammersmith is a traffic town and building work has to fit around it. The streets near the Broadway and the Riverside Studios carry heavy through traffic for much of the day, so deliveries go in quieter windows as smaller, more frequent loads rather than one lorry that blocks a road. Parking sits within controlled zones throughout, and permits or suspended bays are arranged before the first day so a team is not circling while the meter runs. Where a skip is not practical, waste is bagged and collected on a booked schedule.

Inside, the constraint is the hallway. These terraces rarely have side access, so everything from plasterboard to the steel for an RSJ installation comes through the front door past your staircase. We board floors, protect the newel and spindles, and sheet walls before any material moves. Scaffolding that stands on the footway needs a licence from Hammersmith and Fulham Council, which we apply for as part of the programme. Neighbours get told what is happening and when, which in a terraced street is worth more than most people expect.

Where to go next for work in Hammersmith: kitchen renovation in Hammersmith, house extensions in Hammersmith, the Hammersmith and Fulham area guide, building work in Shepherd's Bush, building work in Chiswick and Listed Building Renovation.