A biscuit-and-brick town with a lot of slate roofs
Reading more than quadrupled in seventy years, from 16,048 people in 1831 to 72,217 in 1901. The railway came in 1840, and by the 1900s Huntley & Palmers employed up to a quarter of the town's workers. They needed terraces, and the town built them from its own clay. There were 52 brick makers here by 1851.
Newtown went up for biscuit factory workers within walking distance of the works. Cemetery Junction was fields when the station opened and was ringed with terraces by 1900. Across the river, Lower Caversham's terraces date from the late 1880s and 1890s.
For a loft, the numbers that matter come from the council's 2013 survey of private housing. Terraced houses made up 42% of the private stock, and 28% of it was built before 1919. That is a lot of cut timber roofs under Welsh slate, which is the best starting point you can ask for. Plenty have since been reroofed in concrete tile, so get the rafters looked at before anyone promises you a dormer.
Fitting the conversion to the house
Here is how each type tends to suit Reading's housing. Each links to a full guide.
L-shaped dormer. If your Victorian terrace has a two-storey back addition, this is the one to look at. The second section over the outrigger is where the shower room usually goes.
Rear dormer. On an ordinary terrace or semi outside a conservation area, a rear dormer is normally permitted development. The council's design guide still asks for dormers set within the roof slope, and says two small ones can look better than one big box.
Hip to gable. Worth asking about on the interwar houses that filled in Caversham Heights and the post-war ones around Emmer Green. Reading's guide wants a pair of semis to stay symmetrical where possible, so if next door already has a gable, you're in a good position.
Read our full guide: Hip-to-Gable Loft Conversions: What It Involves and Which Houses It Suits →
Rooflights only. The council's guide says a rooflight-only conversion does not normally need planning consent. In St Peter's, the Caversham conservation area, the appraisal prefers rooflights on the rear slope rather than the street side.
Mansard. Rare here and always a planning application. The Castle Hill appraisal points to a short row on Coley Place as the only surviving early mansards in that conservation area, which tells you how unusual the form is in that part of town.
Extra bedroom. What most families here are after. Building control will check the protected stair route, fire doors and linked smoke alarms before signing off, so make sure they're priced in.
Home office. The Elizabeth line has run straight from Reading into central London since 2022. If you work some days at home, a room in the roof beats the box room. Run a data cable up while the walls are open.
Read our full guide: Loft Home-Office Conversion: What Works Well Up There and What to Specify →
En-suite. On a narrow terrace the soil stack position decides almost everything. Plan the bathroom from the first drawing, not after.
Planning. Reading has 15 conservation areas and a set of Article 4 terraces where even a rear dormer needs an application. Outside those, most rear dormers are permitted development. Check before paying for drawings.
Cost. We don't publish a Reading price. A slate terrace with good headroom and a 1970s trussed roof are different jobs, and only a site visit will tell you which one you've got.
Patterned brick terraces and the conservation areas
Reading's heritage study calls polychrome brick a distinctive characteristic of the town. Colliers, the dominant local firm, was known for red brick with diaper patterns and terracotta, and light grey brick is a Reading signature. To protect it, the council has fifteen Article 4 directions on short runs of houses, among them Jesse Terrace, School Terrace and parts of Field Road, Wantage Road, Rectory Road and Wokingham Road. The council says these remove all permitted development rights, extensions included. If you live on one of them, assume any dormer needs permission.
The 15 conservation areas take in Castle Hill and Russell Street, Christchurch, Redlands, Alexandra Road, St Peter's in Caversham, The Mount and Eldon Square among others. Inside any of them, a dormer or hip to gable needs planning permission on the back slope as well as the front. Castle Hill went onto Historic England's at-risk register in 2018, and its appraisal lists poor quality dormers among the things harming it. Expect close scrutiny there.
Reading sits on chalk, with clay over it to the south-east, and the chalk was mined. After a collapse in Field Road in January 2000 the council investigated ground under more than fifty properties around Field Road and Coley. If you live in that part of town, tell your structural engineer before the steels are designed.
Which council, and who signs it off
Not every Reading postcode is Reading Borough. Earley and Lower Earley are in Wokingham Borough, and parts of Tilehurst and Purley fall under West Berkshire. Your planning application goes to whichever council covers your address, so check before you search a register.
Inside the borough, building control is an in-house team at the Civic Centre on Bridge Street, with no phone line on its contact page. You email building.control@reading.gov.uk with the site details and they come back to you. When the work passes you get a completion certificate. File it with the deeds, because a buyer's solicitor will ask.
Where these facts come from
- Reading Borough Council: conservation areas and listed buildings
- Reading Borough Council: Article 4 directions
- Reading Borough Council: Design Guide to House Extensions SPD (2021)
- Reading Borough Council: contact building control
- Reading Borough Council: Private Sector Housing Stock Condition Report
- Reading Borough Council: Historic Area Assessment 2022
- Castle Hill/Russell Street/Oxford Road Conservation Area Appraisal (2020)
- Reading Museum: Reading's nineteenth-century boom
- Earley Town Council: town guide
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Questions people in Reading ask
I live on one of the Article 4 terraces. Can I still do a rear dormer?
Possibly, but not without an application. Reading's patterned brickwork directions on streets such as Jesse Terrace and School Terrace remove all permitted development rights. The council's Article 4 page lists the exact house numbers covered. Rooflights on the back slope are the gentlest option to put to the planners.
My house is in Earley. Does Reading council deal with my loft?
No. Earley is in Wokingham Borough, so your planning application goes to Wokingham Borough Council even though your address says Reading. Do the same check in the West Berkshire parts of Tilehurst and Purley.
Will Reading accept a flat-roofed box dormer on the front of my terrace?
Unlikely. Reading's house extensions guide, adopted in 2021, names box dormers on the front of houses as harmful and says dormers should sit within the roof slope. A smaller dormer, or two small ones lined up with the windows below, has a far better chance.
I'm in Caversham Park Village. Is my roof worth converting?
The estate went up between 1964 and the early 1970s, and houses of that age often have trussed roofs rather than cut timber. A conversion is still possible, but the trusses have to be replaced with a steel frame. Get a surveyor up the loft hatch before you commit to anything.