Planning permission doesn’t mean you can start building. It means you can start the three professional stages that have to happen before a builder ever picks up a tool: structural engineering, building regulations drawings, and appointing a builder. Only once all three are done does the actual build begin. Here’s what each stage involves, roughly […]

Nearly everyone who ends up with a bad builder story says the same thing: looking back, they never actually asked the right questions before signing anything. Whether you’re typing ‘builder near me’ into Google or searching specifically for an extension builder in Essex, the results rarely tell you who’s actually reliable. What follows are the

No, there’s no legal requirement to hire a registered professional for a house extension in England. What you do need is a full set of proper drawings: planning drawings, structural calculations, and building regulations drawings. Any qualified design company can produce these; the title itself isn’t what matters; it’s the documents. Kirkwood handles all three

Hearing that your extension needs piled foundations tends to set off alarm bells. The word ‘piling’ sounds expensive, and the natural assumption is that your budget is about to be blown wide open. Usually, that’s not actually what happens. Piling does add cost to a project, somewhere in the region of £8,000 to £20,000, but

Yes — almost certainly. In around 99 per cent of house extension projects, a structural engineer is required. Nearly every extension involves new foundations, steelwork, structural openings, new floors, or a roof — all of which need to be properly designed and calculated by a structural engineer before Building Control will approve the work or

A site plan is a scaled drawing showing the property from above — including the boundary, the house, and any outbuildings or structures on the site. It shows where the proposed extension will sit in relation to the existing house, the garden, the boundaries, and the neighbouring properties. Site plans are required for planning applications,

A single storey rear extension does not always need full planning permission — but it always needs some form of planning process. Most single storey rear extensions qualify as permitted development, meaning a full planning application is not required. However, you should not simply assume the project complies and start building. Even the most straightforward

Retrospective planning permission is planning permission obtained after building works have already been carried out — rather than before they began. It is a recognised legal process: an application is submitted to the council to approve works that already exist. The council assesses a retrospective application on the same planning criteria as any other application.

A planning pre-application is an opportunity to approach the council with a set of architectural plans and present the proposed design to the planning department before submitting the full planning application. It is essentially a way of getting feedback directly from the council before committing to the formal application process — allowing the design to

When people talk about planning permission for a house extension, they often assume there is just one type. In reality, there are several different planning routes, and the one you need depends on the property, the work proposed, and where the property is located. For most house extensions and loft conversions in Essex, the route