Roofers in Yatton Keynell
Roofers in Yatton Keynell, a village on the B4039 near Castle Combe where a conservation area, rubble-stone walls and a church re-roofed in 1868 set the terms for roof work.
Yatton Keynell at a glance
- Distance
- 23.1 road miles south of Stroud
- Council
- Wiltshire Council
- Conservation area
- Yatton Keynell Conservation Area
- Setting
- Southern edge of the Cotswolds National Landscape
Yatton Keynell's roofs: a three-gabled manor, a stone school and an inn across from the church
Yatton Keynell lies on the B4039 near Castle Combe, inside the southern tongue of the Cotswolds. Wikipedia places the village in the southern tongue of the Cotswolds AONB, the former name of the Cotswolds National Landscape, and describes it as a conservation area for much of its extent. With both designations in play, hardly a roof here escapes the interest of the planning team at Wiltshire Council.
The buildings that anchor the village are all dated. The Manor House carries the date 1659, is Grade II* listed and is built of rubble stone with a three-gabled front. The School House and School were built in 1858 and 1859 in local stone. The Bell Inn, opposite the church, is 17th century. St Margaret's Church is said to have been built by Sir William Keynell in 1250, keeps 13th-century work in its lower west tower, and was listed Grade I in 1960.
Domesday records the place as Getone, with three estates and 16 households, so the settlement predates every roof now standing. The stone buildings give a streetscape in which each roof is read against its neighbours, by the height of a ridge, the colour of a slate and the shadow of a verge. A repair that alters one of those gets noticed.
For us that means every Yatton Keynell survey opens with two questions before a tape comes out. Is the building listed? Does the conservation area apply? The quote, and the kind of work we can propose, follow from those answers.
Wooded hillside lined with rows of stone houses and slate roofs 
Stone village houses with slate and tile roofs above green fields
Chapter 01
St Margaret's, the 1868 re‑roofing and how church roof work is authorised
Permission for a church roof runs on its own track, apart from the one a house follows.
Chapter 01In this chapter
St Margaret's is a good example of how many chapters a church roof can have. The 13th-century lower west tower survives, parts were rebuilt in the 15th century, and the church was drastically restored by G. E. Street in 1868, a restoration that included re-roofing. A covering laid in 1868 has now been up for more than 150 years, a useful yardstick whenever anyone calls a roof old. Roofs of that age are normally on their final stretch, or they have been patched and recovered more than once.
The permission route for a church like this surprises many people. Churches in use come under the ecclesiastical exemption. For Church of England buildings, roof work is authorised by a faculty, which is a permission granted through the diocese's consistory court, rather than by listed building consent from the council. The exemption covers only buildings still in use for worship, so a redundant or converted church would normally need listed building consent from the council instead. Whichever route applies, the wording of the application matters, and we help by supplying clear survey photographs and a clear scope.
On the roof itself, a church of this age usually combines several elements: a main covering, lead valleys and flashings where the nave meets the aisle or tower, rainwater goods, and a number of parapets or gutters set in the stonework. Lead is the part that tends to go wrong first. The material itself lasts a very long time when correctly installed, with MyJobQuote giving over 80 years for flashing, but thermal movement can crack it where it is fixed too tightly. Lead comes in codes from 3 to 8, and the code suits the job: Code 4 as the standard general choice for flashing work, and heavier codes such as 6 to 8 where the detail is more demanding. We explain which we propose and why, and our lead roofing page lists the typical national ranges.
The same discipline applies to the village's other old roofs. Street's work of 1868, which also added the vestry, was one big decision taken at one moment. Today we ask the owner or churchwarden to keep the survey report, the quote and the final photographs together, so that the next person responsible for the roof has the same information we had.
A roof laid in 1868 has outlived most of the people who would have remembered it going on.
Myth: A listed church always needs listed building consent before the roof is touched.
Fact: Not for a church in use, where the parish applies to the diocese for a faculty instead.
Chapter 02
Rubble stone, three gables and the Manor House of 1659
A front with three gables has three edges to keep watertight.
Chapter 02In this chapter
Rubble stone is walling built from roughly shaped stones, not squared blocks, set in mortar with the joints following the stones. The Manor House of 1659 is built that way, and so, in its way, is much of the village. For roofers the interest is at the top of the wall. A gable is the triangular end of a pitched roof, and every gable has a verge, the edge of the covering where it overhangs or meets the wall head. A house with a three-gabled front therefore has three verges facing the weather, and wherever those gables meet a main roof there are valleys, the internal angles where two slopes join and water runs together.
Verges and valleys are where leaks begin on old gabled roofs. A verge relies on mortar, stone copings or fixed boards to keep wind-blown rain out of the structure, and rubble stone below it can move slightly over the years. Cracked mortar admits water behind the covering, and the first sign is often a brown mark on a ceiling a metre or so in from the wall. A valley gathers the run-off of two slopes, so one lifted slate or a split lead lining can pour a lot of water into one place.
We therefore survey gabled roofs edge by edge, in the order that water would travel. Each verge is looked at from a ladder or scaffold, the valleys are traced from top to bottom, and the junctions with chimneys and party walls are checked. The report lists them separately, with pictures, so you can see that the stone and mortar at the verge are one repair and the valley lining another. On a house that is listed, as the Manor House is at Grade II*, any change that would affect its character also needs the right consent from Wiltshire Council, so we propose like-for-like work and let you check it with the planning team.
Stone walls and roof timbers move at different rates through the seasons, and old gables show the strain first. A hairline crack in the pointing beneath a verge is cheap to repoint when it is caught early. Left alone, it can become a wet gable wall and a rotted wall plate, a bill several times larger.
The School House and School of 1858 to 1859 show the same village stone in a Victorian public building, a teacher's house facing the road with schoolrooms behind, used as the village school until a new primary school opened across the road in 1998. Buildings of that type have long ridges and deep eaves. A building with a long ridge and a deep eaves line also needs scaffold set up carefully, because the working platform must be wide and the pavement beside it kept clear for the public. If a whole roof is spent, the roof replacement page explains the stages and the typical national costs of a full re-roof.
Chapter 03
Inside the National Landscape: conservation area rules on a village roof
Two layers of designation mean a short phone call to the council can save weeks.
Chapter 03In this chapter
Yatton Keynell is about 23.1 road miles south of Stroud, and it sits in two protected settings at once. The village is largely a conservation area, named Yatton Keynell Conservation Area and held by Wiltshire Council, and the village lies within the southern tongue of the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, now called the Cotswolds National Landscape.
What does that change on a roof? Replacing a covering like for like, with the same material and the same appearance, is not usually treated as development, provided the building's outward appearance is unchanged. Before you rely on that, check whether your home is listed, and ask Wiltshire Council whether anything removes the right. Changing the material is different. So is adding features. A dormer window, for example, is not permitted development in a conservation area or in the National Landscape, so it needs planning permission. Anyone weighing roof windows or a loft conversion will find the limits explained on our skylights page and in its planning guide.
Putting cladding on the outside of a house is another thing permitted development does not cover on such land. None of this is meant to put anyone off. Repair is what the village mostly needs from a roofer, and repair is simple when it stays faithful to what is already up there.
This is why we like to propose the same covering that is on your roof now. On a rubble-stone cottage with stone slates, we keep stone slates in the diminishing courses that give the roof its look, and keep the traditional ridge. On a clay or slate roof we match size, colour and texture and discuss any mismatch before ordering. Cotswold District Council's guidance of 2000 gives the traditional pitch of a Cotswold stone roof as 47° to 55°, and a roof in that range deserves a repair that keeps the line.
We put our proposal in writing with the written quote, so you have a document to send to the planning team if you want their view. Wiltshire Council makes the decisions, and we do not guess at them. Should your job be notifiable under the Building Regulations, we deal with that notification. Our last task is clearing the site and taking the waste with us.
Map showing Yatton Keynell and the Stroud service radius, with nearby towns we also cover.
Near Yatton Keynell
Roof work we do here
The three-gabled manor and the 1868 church roof
My Yatton Keynell home is built of rubble stone. What do you check at the gables?
We look at each verge, the mortar or copings along it, and any valleys where gables meet the main roof. Cracked mortar and lifted slates there are the usual routes for water, and the report shows each separately.
Does St Margaret's need listed building consent for roof repairs?
The ecclesiastical exemption applies while a church is in use, and roof work is authorised by a faculty from the diocese, not the council. The parish can tell you how that process runs. If a church stops being used for worship, listed building consent from the council normally applies instead.
Will the conservation area stop me re-roofing in a different material?
It can complicate matters. Like-for-like work is usually simpler, whereas a change of material needs a conversation with Wiltshire Council's planners before we order anything. Unless you ask for a change, we propose matching materials.
Would a rear dormer on my Yatton Keynell house need a planning application?
Yes, because dormers are not permitted development in a conservation area or the Cotswolds National Landscape. Roof windows are a different matter, and our skylights page and its planning guide cover those options.