10 Essential Considerations Before Renovating a Period Home
Your period home might be of a specific architectural style, or of a mixture of architectural styles, it might be a vernacular period homes built in local traditions and local available materials in regional variations. Your home may be Listed or in a Conservation Area.
In many ways it is a home of a particular architectural or historic significance and your renovation works are about to disturb it.
Whether it is Early Georgian (1714 – 1765), Late Georgian (1765 – 1811), Regency (1811 – 1837), Victorian (1837 – 1901) or Edwardian (1901 – 1914), here are ten key considerations to help you understand your home better and to inform your future design decisions for your renovation project.
Be ready to pivot, adapt, and maybe even embrace a few surprises along the way.
Article written for i-Build magazine by George Omalianakis, GOAStudio London residential architecture.
10 Essential Considerations Before Renovating a Period Home
This feature provides a concise introduction to the subject. For more detailed guidance on design, construction, consent, retrofit, budgets and timescales, read our complete guide to renovating a period home in London.
1. Get the experts in – Do not “Call Saul”.
At the start of your project you will need to be able to “spot a problem before it becomes your problem” so you will need to appoint professionals with the right type of experience, expertise, knowledge and qualifications to help you achieve this.
Period properties are full of potential problems that will escalate if you do not catch them early.
If you can discover a problem early, you give yourself an excellent chance to circumnavigate it during the design development stage and not spending money to deal with it during the construction stage.
Depending on your project requirements you are likely need to expertise of one or more of the following professionals: building surveyor, architect, structural engineer, building services engineer, fire consultant, heritage consultant, damp / timber consultant, and a party wall surveyor.
2. Think long term – Right notes in the right order.
How long do you plan to live in the house? How will your needs change during this period? What parts of the house are currently in need of repair? What is your budget?
Take a step back and allow the answers to these questions to inform your decisions about how to renovate your property and to test if your home is suited to certain types of extensions and alterations.
Whether you do your renovation in a single phase or whether you choose to phase it over several years you still need to play the right notes in the right order, for example:
• Insulate before you install solar panels or before you upgrade your heating system.
• Draft proof before considering changing the single / double glazing to triple glazing.
• Consider the risks and understand the complications of fitting internal wall insulation.
3. Why is your period home significant – The Significant Other.
Period homes are likely to have some level of significance even if only around 2% of them are Listed.
In practical and construction terms there is no difference between a Listed and a non-Listed property. However you need to take a different approach with a Listed building during the design and construction stage and you need to obtain additional approvals.
Your architect and heritage consultant will assess the aesthetic, communal, evidential or historical values of significance of your property and suggest alternatives if your proposed renovation works are harmful to the significance of your property.
4. Your period home is vapour permeable and hygroscopic – What does this mean?
This means that, unlike new homes and modern construction, your period home was originally built with the intention to “breathe”. It absorbs moisture, it releases moisture, constantly and effectively.
The walls and the building fabric of your home will naturally absorb moisture and release that moisture to remove water vapour and allow your home to dry.
This is the invisible, centuries’ old, dynamic equilibrium performed by the fabric of your home and it is important that your renovation works retain this equilibrium to avoid risks of condensation, creation of mould, poor internal air quality that results in health issues.
5. Which part of my period home is vapour permeable? – Straw, sticks and bricks.
This is probably the most common problem when renovating and extending period properties. Get advice on the specific treatments, solutions, and suitable building products for your period home.
Permeability is a variable quality and it tends to apply to traditional bricks, building stonework, mortars, renders and plasters, unglazed tiles, cob / earth building elements, lime washes, and other traditional finishes.
Timber, reed and thatch tend to be very permeable at the end grain and less so to the sides.
When renovating you need to use materials and techniques that are compatible with the fabric of your home otherwise you may encounter moisture issues down the line.
6. Repair before you renovate – The low hanging fruit
Make sure the building fabric of the house is in good condition before you start making decisions on internal paints, fixtures and fittings.
Repairs to gutters to stop water infiltration and damp issues, replacement of faulty flashings, window frame repairs, draft proofing measures, energy efficient lighting, basic heating controls, better control settings, rainwater harvesting tanks are all examples of measures that can be implemented on a budget and that will contribute to the thermal performance and comfort of your home.
For guidance look at the Energy Performance Certificate and any Home Survey Report and pass this information to your specialist architect who will be able to advise on how you can implement these measures, and in what order, as part of the rest of your project.
7. Energy efficiency matters – “Risk-first” approach
Before you alter or introduce a new building element to your home it is paramount that you assess the risk and impact of any alteration or renovation.
There is high technical complexity and risks, and you need to be able to foresee the knock-on effect of any alteration you make. This will allow you to counter it before it becomes a costly problem you will have to face in the future.
• Adding insulation – make sure you do not create cold-bridging at junctions that will surely create condensation.
• Improving the airtightness to assist with retaining heat in the house – you need to add more ventilation to avoid the risk of mould creation on wall surfaces.
• Changes to the fabric or appearance of the property that might harm the significance of the protected or Listed property – you might not be allowed to retrofit external insulation or replace your windows with double / triple glazed units.
There is a very fine balance that needs to be struck between maximising the environmental performance of an historic property and the protection of its significance.
8. Design matters – Old (form) with new (clothes) or new (form) with old (clothes)
A good architect should be able to consider the needs to your period home alongside your lifestyle requirements and come up with a design solution in keeping with the character of your home whilst providing the functionality you and your family require.
Here is a rule I have found useful over the years.
In order to create the right level of balance and tension and rhythm between new and old, you could choose to clad a contemporary extension with traditional materials.
Or alternatively, you can choose to design an extension in a traditional form and this allows you to be more modern and experimental with your choice of external materials, openings and cladding.
Never go with Old + Old, and never go with New + New for your period home.
9. Window matters – A love note.
Here is what Historic England notes in its guidance on Care, Repair and Upgrading of Traditional Windows:
“The loss of traditional windows from our older buildings poses one of the major threats to our heritage. Traditional windows and their glazing make an important contribution to the significance of historic areas. They are an integral part of the design of older buildings and can be important artefacts in their own right, often made with great skill and ingenuity with materials of a higher quality than are generally available today. The distinctive appearance of historic hand-made glass is not easily imitated in modern glazing.”
Windows have a distinct identity, detailing and character and they can make your home look just right.
Even subtle changes to the thickness and type of frames, changes to the way they open and operate, or changes to their proportions and size, can make windows appear out of step with the visual language of the rest of the property.
10. Rules and Regulation matters – Ask your architect.
If your property is nationally Listed you will face criminal charges if you carry out alterations to the property without obtaining Listed Building Consent.
For properties in Conservation Areas you still need to obtain planning permission for a large number of external renovations. Read the Conservation Area Appraisal document prepared by your local planning authority to get an idea about what alterations are likely to obtain planning permission.
For non Listed period homes, and for properties not in a conservation areas, you should be able to take advantage of Permitted Development Rights in some circumstances however certain types of extensions and alterations will still require obtaining planning permissions.
George Omalianakis, BA (Hons) B.Arch Pg Dip Environ.Design ARB RIBA
Specialism in Historic Buildings and Conservation Areas, RIBA Conservation Registrant
Level 3 Award in Energy Efficiency for Older and Traditional Buildings
BOROUGH SPECIFIC ARCHITECT AND PLANNING GUIDES FOR YOUR HOME PROJECT
Your local Council will have in place design and planning requirements for your home project and you will need to obtain planning approval for a wide range of extensions and alterations to your property.
When you get in touch we will offer you detailed advice about what is likely that your Council will approve and in the meantime we have prepared the following architectural and planning guides that include extracts of the relevant planning policy and examples of our projects in our Borough.
Barnet architects | Planning and design homeowner guide, Camden residential architect and planning guide, Enfield residential architect and planning guide, Hackney residential architect and planning guide, Hammersmith Fulham residential architect and planning guide, Haringey architects | Planning and design homeowner guide and planning guide, Islington residential architect and planning guide, Kensington and Chelsea Conservation architects, residential and planning guide, Lambeth residential architect and planning guide, Lewisham residential architect and planning guide, Newham residential architect and planning guide, Tower Hamlets residential architect and planning guide, Waltham Forest residential architect and planning guide, Wandsworth residential architect and planning guide, Westminster residential architect and planning guide
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