Wimbledon

Flat Roofing in Wimbledon

Two customers live here. Up the hill, somebody owns a whole house and the extension, dormer or outbuilding on the back of it, and wants the work done without the street noticing. Down in the town, a block owns the roof and nobody living under it does, so the same fault becomes a document before it becomes a job.

Or call us on 07593 196505

The district

What Wimbledon actually covers

The village at the top with the common beside it, the Ridgway running west along the crest, the slope of Wimbledon Hill Road joining them to the Broadway, and the town at the bottom around the stations. Detached houses and long gardens above; retail, offices and purpose-built flats below, packed into a few hundred metres.

Local stock

The roofs of Wimbledon

  • Large houses on the hill. Space at the back has been used, so these properties carry single-storey additions, flat-topped dormers and a garden building or two, each with its own covering and its own age. Where the boarding beneath is still dry, the answer is an overlay or a re-covering rather than taking the structure apart.
  • Mansion blocks and purpose-built flats in the town. Communal roofs come with lift overruns, tank rooms, aerials and whatever has been bolted down over the years, and the client is the block rather than a resident. A condition report that can be circulated is what moves those decisions along.
  • The Broadway parades and mixed buildings. Shops and offices with accommodation over them put trading hours, roof access and tenants into the middle of a straightforward roofing job, which is why they are run as commercial work even when the building is mostly residential.

The wider area

The wide shot: Merton

Wimbledon is the northern end of a borough that carries on through Morden to Mitcham: the whole Merton picture. For the streets east and south of here, the Edwardian grid at Wimbledon Park and the interwar roads towards the Chase, see flat roofing in SW19.

Questions

Frequently asked questions

Does conservation-area status up the hill stop a flat roof being renewed?

It rarely stops it and it usually shapes it. The controls here are about what the street and the common can see, and the flat roofs on these houses are almost all behind the ridge or at the back of the plot. Where a proposal would change something visible, the council is asked before the specification is fixed rather than after the scaffold arrives.

Who instructs the work on a mansion block off the Broadway?

Whoever holds the freehold or runs the residents’ management company, and usually through a managing agent. The individual flat reporting the stain is not the client and cannot be, because the covering is communal. What the decision needs is a report addressed to the block: what has failed, where, and what the options are, in a form that can be circulated to leaseholders.

Do you cover Wimbledon Park and South Wimbledon as well?

Yes, and they have their own page because they are their own kind of housing. The Edwardian grid at Wimbledon Park, Merton Park and the interwar streets towards the Chase are covered under flat roofing in SW19. This page is the hill and the town: the larger houses and the blocks, where the questions are about consent and about who owns the roof.

A flat roof problem in Wimbledon?

A house on the hill or a block in the town: tell us which and what has happened.

Give us a phone number or an email address, whichever suits you.

A picture of the stain inside, or of the roof if there is a safe window to take one from, usually saves a question. They go up when you press send, which is the slowest part on a phone signal, and the form will tell you how far it has got.

Or call 07593 196505

Coming out and pricing the work is free; a written condition survey carries a fee, agreed before the visit and taken off the price of the work if you go ahead.