Short answer
A conservation rooflight is a modern rooflight made to look like the old cast-iron ones: low, slim and often with a central bar. It sits close to the roof slope instead of standing proud of it, which is why people choose it for older and protected houses. A free survey decides whether it suits yours.
- 10-year workmanship guarantee
- We handle the Building Control notification where notifiable
What the name refers to
The word "conservation" describes how the unit looks and carries no legal status. Old roofs often had small cast-iron rooflights set low in the slate, with thin frames and a bar down the middle. A conservation rooflight borrows that outline in a current product, so a new opening reads as part of an old roof.
The look comes from three things: a slim frame, glazing bars where the design calls for them, and a profile that stays low to the slope. Our conservation rooflights page gathers the wider guidance on the subject.
How it differs from a standard unit
A standard roof window is built for broad daylight and ease of use, and it can have a deeper, plainer frame. A conservation rooflight gives some of that up in favour of the appearance of the original. Next to a lantern or a flat-glass unit raised on an upstand, it works differently again, since it is set into a pitched slope.
VELUX says its conservation roof window comes with glazing choices such as an easy-to-clean coating and a laminated inner pane, and that availability varies with the window chosen and its glazing. We talk through the choices for your roof at the survey, rather than from a catalogue.
Details that make it look right
The proportions do the work. A frame that is slim enough to read as a line, a bar placed where an old one would have been and a unit sized to the spacing of the rafters all help the glass sit quietly in the roof. A unit that is too large for the slope loses the effect, however good the frame.
That is also why we want to see the roof first. Slates, tiles and rafter spacing differ from house to house, and the right size follows from them. Sending a photograph of the slope beforehand gives us something to discuss.
Why people choose one
The reasons lie in the roof and the street. A slate roof on a Victorian terrace, a stone cottage or a listed barn can look wrong with a large modern frame set into it. A conservation rooflight keeps the roof reading as it did, and it still brings daylight to a stair, a landing or a loft room.
The evening matters too. From the street, a small dark pane in a slate roof is quiet. From inside, the glass reads black at night, so a blind is worth considering in a bedroom.
The rooms and roofs it suits
A conservation rooflight tends to go where the roof is pitched and the covering is slate or clay tile: a stair landing under a rear slope, a bathroom in a roof space, a loft room that needs a second source of daylight. A cottage kitchen with a sloping ceiling is another candidate.
It is less natural on a flat roof, where a flat rooflight or a lantern is the usual choice. If you are unsure which family your roof belongs to, our guide to lanterns and flat rooflights shows the other side of the choice.
Does it avoid planning permission?
No. A conservation rooflight is exempt from nothing. In Wales, a house on article 1(5) land, or within a World Heritage Site, has no permission under Class C to put a rooflight into a roof slope. That land includes conservation areas as well as National Parks and AONBs. An application is needed in those places, and a house outside the boundary line is not caught.
Elsewhere, a rooflight on a house can be permitted development if it protrudes no more than 150 mm beyond the plane of the original roof slope and sits no higher than the highest part of the original roof. A listed house needs listed building consent where the work would affect its character. These householder rights belong to houses and a flat or maisonette has none; a council can withdraw them with an Article 4 direction.
The planning guide covers the rules in full, and our pages on conservation areas and listed building consent go further.
Fitting, cost and the next step
Each fitting is shaped to its roof: the covering is trimmed around the frame, and the flashing follows the line of the slates. A fresh opening usually involves structural changes to the roof, whereas a like-for-like swap into a sound opening avoids most of that. Where the work is notifiable, we handle the Building Regulations notification with local authority building control or a registered building control approver.
The price depends on size, frame and bars, glazing and the roof, so it comes after the survey as a fixed written quote. Our answer on what a conservation rooflight costs lists what moves the figure, and the survey form books the visit.