Raglan sits in Monmouthshire, a 17.7 mile road journey north-east from Newport
New rooflights and skylights in Raglan
- 10-year workmanship guarantee
- We handle the Building Control notification where notifiable
Farmhouses, cottages and the stone from the castle
Raglan, a village and community in Monmouthshire, is Rhaglan in Welsh. Raglan Castle was built for William ap Thomas and is now maintained by Cadw. After 1415 the castle was greatly expanded, and by 1587 contemporary descriptions refer to Raglan as a town. In the 18th century its neglected ruins served as a quarry for people who needed stone to repair their houses, and dressed and moulded stones can still be seen in farmhouses and cottages in the area. By 1632, a courthouse was established in Raglan. The local railway station closed in 1955, and its buildings have been removed to St Fagans.
A house of that kind may have a roof that has been re-covered more than once, a lean-to at the back where the kitchen or utility room grew, and upstairs ceilings that follow the rafters. Larger houses bring tall stairwells and landings that are a long way from the nearest window. We read each roof on the day, because no general description fits every house.
| Kind of house | Roof and room | Likely answer |
|---|---|---|
| Stone farmhouse or cottage | Pitched roof, bedroom ceiling following the slope | A conservation rooflight, if the planning route allows |
| Cottage with a lean-to at the back | Low or flat roof over a kitchen or utility room | A flat rooflight |
| Larger house with a tall stairwell | Pitched roof, glass well out of reach | An electric opening rooflight |
Conservation, flat and electric rooflights for Raglan houses
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Raglan's conservation area and Monmouthshire's decisions
Monmouthshire County Council decides planning matters in Raglan, and the conservation area appraisals on its site include a Raglan one. In Wales, a rooflight put into the roof slope of a house inside a conservation area is not permitted development, so it needs a planning application. The boundary is what counts, and the council can say where it runs for an address. Everything else about the Welsh rules is in our guide to skylight planning permission.
If the house is listed, listed building consent comes first wherever the work would affect its character, and that application goes to Monmouthshire as well. A flat has no householder rights of this sort at all.
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Villages and towns beyond Raglan
Under the slope of a stone cottage
Bedrooms with sloping ceilings, and glass that has to be agreed first.
Dressed and moulded stones from the ruined castle can be seen in farmhouses and cottages in the area. A cottage can have small windows low in the walls, and a bedroom upstairs where the ceiling follows the roof. It can be a pleasant room and a dim one.
A roof window or a conservation rooflight puts sky into that kind of room. The difference between the two is how they sit on the roof, and how the house looks from the lane, so the first conversation is about the view from outside as well as the light inside. The guide to rooflights in Welsh conservation areas goes through the planning side in detail.
For a listed cottage, the order of work matters. In Wales, listed building consent now comes under the Historic Environment (Wales) Act 2023, in force from 4 November 2024, and it is needed where a change would affect the building's character. Doing the work without it can be an offence, so the glass is ordered after the consent, not before.
Energy rules have a special case for old houses. Approved Document L (Wales) is guidance, and it gives a fallback for replacement windows and roof windows on homes of architectural or historic interest where the usual 1.4 W/m²K cannot be reached. It gives no such fallback for rooflights.
Blinds are easy to forget until the first light arrives. A blackout blind for a bedroom roof window is chosen from the maker's range for that window. In an old cottage it is also the thing that makes the room usable when the sun is up early.
From the lane, a roof is seen at a low angle, so what shows is the edge of the frame more than the glass. So a look at the roof from the road is as useful as one from inside.
At night the new glass goes dark and shows the room back, with the lamp and the bed in it. It does not need a curtain to keep out the outside, only a blind for when the room is used for sleeping.
Fitting a roof window brings the Building Regulations in. Where the work is notifiable, we handle the notification with local authority building control or a registered building control approver.
Can you reach the glass over your stairwell?
Electric opening rooflights for ceilings that are a long way up.
Can you reach the glass over your stairwell? In some houses the answer is no. A tall stair hall can have a rooflight at the top that is too far above the landing to open by hand, and a fixed unit up there gives light but no air.
Air is worth having. A stairwell can act as the chimney of a house in warm weather, and the top landing can hold the day's heat well into the evening. An opening rooflight lets some of it out, and an electric one can do that from a switch on the wall, not from a pole and a hook. Our page on choosing electric or manual opening compares the two.
Ventilation rules treat opening glass in a particular way. Approved Document F (Wales) wants every habitable room to have purge ventilation, meaning a fast way to air it. With hinged or pivot windows the area needed depends on the angle: opening 30° or more calls for an opening area of one twentieth of the floor area, opening between 15° and 30° calls for a tenth, and under 15° it does not count. That is guidance about habitable rooms, so a stair hall is a different question from a bedroom, and the survey takes the two apart.
Rain is a fair worry about an opening rooflight left open all day. Shutting itself when rain starts is something VELUX gives its solar and electric roof windows through a built-in sensor.
Heat is the other side of it. Approved Document L (Wales) says a new or replacement roof window in an existing home should have a U-value no worse than 1.4 W/m²K, or a Window Energy Rating of Band B, while a rooflight should have a U-value no worse than 2.2 W/m²K.
Where an electric unit goes matters to the cable. The wiring has to reach it before the ceiling is lined, so the cable and the opening are best planned together.
The wiring side is covered in the power supply answer.
A flat roof over the boot room
Flat rooflights for a lean-to at the back.
Behind many a village house there is a lean-to: a boot room, a utility room, a small kitchen added later. Its roof is low or flat, and it has one window at best. A flat rooflight turns that room into somewhere you can see what you are doing in the daytime.
The roof under it is the first thing to look at. VELUX says its flat roof dome suits roofs pitched between 0 and 15°, and Rainclear's installation guide advises at least 5° of slope on the upstand under its flat glass rooflights, so that water does not pool. Each is a maker talking about its own product and nothing wider.
Size comes second. The unit's U-value is worked out over its whole developed surface, so the area counted is often bigger than the hole in the roof. Where the kerb arrives as one assembly with the rooflight, the 2.2 W/m²K guidance in Approved Document L (Wales) takes in the kerb too.
At ten to ten in the evening, the glass over a boot room is black. It shows the coat hooks and the ceiling lamp, and the lamp's reflection sits in it like a second bulb. Not much is needed beyond a clean, square lining, which is what stops the opening looking like a hole.
Cleaning matters more in a room with muddy boots. Self-cleaning glass is one option; Pilkington's Activ coating is made for that: light breaks the dirt's grip and rain carries it off. Whether it suits a given flat rooflight depends on the product.
Reaching the roof to clean it is rarely easy from a lean-to with a garden door and a gutter. Whoever cleans it will want to know early whether the glass can be reached from inside, which is a question for the survey.
Wet coats and boots put moisture into the air of a boot room, and the cold glass overhead is where it can settle. A rooflight that opens helps, and so does a lining that is smooth enough to wipe down.
Glazing is the other choice. VELUX offers a choice of double or triple glazing on its flat and curved glass units, which VELUX ties to energy efficiency and sound reduction, and the page on a double or triple glazed rooflight sets out the trade.
If a flat-roof glass unit is ever replaced, the answer on replacing a flat rooflight explains the job.
Flat rooflight, boot room
- Roof
- Low or flat, over a lean-to
- Day
- Daylight from above, where there was one small window
- Night
- Black glass that holds the lamp's reflection
- Energy guidance
- Rooflight U-value no worse than 2.2 W/m²K
Raglan, asked and answered
Raglan is how far from Newport?
It is 17.7 road miles to the north-east. The survey costs nothing. Raglan, or Rhaglan in Welsh, is a Monmouthshire village and community.
Which Raglan houses does the conservation area rule touch?
Only those inside the boundary. A rooflight in the roof slope of one of them is not permitted development, and a planning application is needed; our skylight planning permission guide explains why. The council confirms where the boundary runs for a given address.
Can an old stone cottage take a roof window?
It depends on the roof, the room and the planning route. The roof covering, the pitch and the timbers over the room all count, and so does whether the house is listed or inside the conservation area. The survey looks at each before any price is given.
What does Cadw do in Raglan?
Cadw maintains Raglan Castle. It also recommends which buildings should be listed, though the Welsh Ministers compile the list, and the council takes the applications for listed building consent.
Does a new rooflight need Building Regulations approval?
It will generally need approval from a building control body. Wales has two kinds, the local authority service and a private registered building control approver, and the choice between them is yours. We handle the notification where the work is notifiable.
How do I get a Raglan survey booked?
Fill in the survey form, or reach us on WhatsApp at 07880 284133 or at info@supremeskylightsnewport.co.uk. Say which room and which kind of roof you are asking about.
Book your free survey
10-year workmanship guarantee.
Building Control notification handled where notifiable.