Builders and plumbers in Highgate Village, N6

Haringey’s Highgate appraisal states that the village is divided between Haringey and Camden. The southern edge of Haringey’s conservation area follows the borough boundary along the middle of Highgate High Street. Camden’s appraisal describes the same line from the other side, as the northern edge of its own conservation area. Camden’s document also covers Pond Square and The Grove, both on its side of the line. A shop with a flat above can answer to one council while the frontage opposite answers to the other.

So the side of the street is the first fact in any village brief. We confirm the planning authority for the exact address, then use that council’s policies map, planning history and appraisal. Parking suspensions and highway licences go to the authority that controls the road, which may be Haringey, Camden or Transport for London. A letter or approval from one council does not settle a question that belongs to the other.

Haringey’s list of conservation areas records Highgate as designated on 21 December 1967. Its appraisal audits the area under statutory and locally listed buildings, positive contributors and shopfronts of merit. On the High Street it notes the grade II listed Rose and Crown public house. Where the appraisal and the National Heritage List differ on a detail such as a street number, we rely on the list entry for listing.

Camden adopted its own Highgate conservation area appraisal and management strategy in October 2007. Camden’s page says the document is used in assessing planning applications in the Highgate conservation area. The page also publishes a map of the two boroughs’ boundaries. The documents describe one village from different sides of the line. Each is the reference its council uses when judging a shopfront, a roof or a rear addition. We design to the one that applies to the address.

The Highgate Neighbourhood Plan is a third layer. Haringey’s page says it was adopted on 20 July 2017 and forms part of its statutory development plan. Camden’s page records adoption on 11 September 2017. Both councils re-designated the forum on 8 September 2023. The plan adds policies for the mapped area. It does not grant permission or replace either council’s decision.

Listing is separate. Historic England’s National Heritage List is the official register of listed buildings, and we search it by address and map rather than by appearance. Article 4 directions are made by each borough. Haringey’s page on development in conservation areas names four areas with directions: Noel Park, Peabody Cottages, Rookfield Estate and Tower Gardens. Highgate is not among them. Camden’s appraisal said its use of Article 4 directions would be kept under review. For a Camden-side address we confirm the current position with Camden.

Haringey’s appraisal describes the early village High Street as small-scale eighteenth and nineteenth-century terrace houses with traditionally fronted shops. It warns that Georgian frontages may conceal earlier structures behind them. Camden’s appraisal makes the same point and records a late medieval timber structure found inside one High Street building on the Haringey side. Behind many frontages run long, narrow burgage plots, some opening out at the edge of the Highgate Bowl.

We open up a small area before fixing a method. Lime render, slate or clay coverings, sash repair and cast-iron rainwater goods are matched to what is found, not to a catalogue. Haringey’s appraisal states plainly that UPVC is not suitable for use in a conservation area. Where a building is listed, window changes are checked for listed building consent before anything is ordered. On a frontage of merit the shopfront, fascia and stallriser are treated as fabric, not as a fit-out.

Much of the village core is mixed use, with homes above trading floors and party walls. Before we touch a stack, a floor or a rear wall we establish who owns what. A lease over a shop may exclude the roof, the front elevation and the joists between the two demises. The freeholder’s written consent can be needed alongside planning permission and Building Regulations approval.

Government guidance says you must tell your neighbours before building work on or near a shared boundary. It adds that a party wall agreement is different from planning or building regulations approval. On a High Street terrace that can mean notices to the owners on both sides, one of whom may own a shop. Shared drainage, gas and electrical routes often pass through the shop below. We map them, agree isolations with the occupiers affected and record who approved each step.

Rear additions, lower-ground conversions and roof rooms are ambitions on a plot that is narrow at the street and long behind. Each meets a control. Haringey’s appraisal singles out dormer windows, original features, brickwork and render, shopfronts and forecourt parking as development management issues. Camden’s strategy performs the same role, and the neighbourhood plan can add its own tests.

We begin with a measured survey, a condition review and a services strategy, then set the scope against those documents. Building Regulations approval is its own route. Government guidance explains that it differs from planning permission and that both may be needed. The applicant may choose the council’s building control service or a private registered building control approver. The written scope names what is verified, what is assumed and what will be known once a floor or render comes off.

Highgate Underground station stands on Archway Road and is served by the Northern line. Haringey’s zone list includes a Highgate zone and two Highgate Station zones. Whether a street falls in one is checked on the council’s map, not assumed. On a Camden-side street we use Camden’s parking pages instead. If a skip or materials must stand in a Haringey bay, the council requires a parking bay suspension. A separate skip or building materials licence is needed too. Skips may not go on the pavement or in a front garden, and only one may stand at a time.

Scaffold or hoarding on a public road or footway needs Haringey’s licence; work wholly on private land does not. Transport for London licenses scaffolds, skips and hoardings on its red routes; its boundary map shows which roads those are. The roads around the village are checked on that map before a delivery route is fixed.

A Highgate Village file should let the next owner or council officer see which authority approved what. We record the borough confirmed for the address, the appraisal relied on, the neighbourhood plan check and any list entry number. Each decision notice is filed with its conditions. Building control completion evidence goes under the route used, with party wall notices and awards beside it.

Work that will be hidden is photographed, with its position noted, before it is covered. That includes lintels over shop openings, fire-stopping between a flat and the shop below, parapet flashings and drains across a long rear yard. Where historic fabric was repaired we note the mortar, coating and timber used. We do not describe an inspection as a certificate it is not. For a listed frontage the file records what was retained, so a future officer can see it was cared for, not replaced.