Skylight and rooflight fitting in Ogmore-by-Sea

Ogmore-by-Sea is a seaside village in the community of St Brides Major, in the Vale of Glamorgan. Out beyond the shore lies Tusker Rock, a reef that vanishes completely at high tide. Many ships were wrecked on it, and local tales speak of organised wrecking along the Vale coast, with false lights luring vessels in, though no historical evidence supports them.

People have been here a long time. A polished flint axe-head of the Seamer type turned up at Ogmore Mill in 1976. A church was begun in one of the village's houses in 1954, and by 1968 a purpose-built hall stood ready for the group to meet in. The congregation marked its 50th anniversary in 2018. In December 2025, hundreds of hobnailed Victorian shoes washed up on the beach.

From Swansea the village lies 25.49 road miles away to the south-east, within the 30 road miles we cover. Its Welsh name, Aberogwr, means the mouth of the River Ogmore, and it sits in the St Brides Major community. Our work reaches St Brides Major, Porthcawl and Laleston too.

A rooflight job in a place like this starts with the roof, whatever year the house was built. On a pitched slope the choice is a roof window lying in line with the covering. Over a flat extension it is a kerbed rooflight or else a lantern raised on an upstand. A hallway under a loft, with blank walls on every side, suits a sun tunnel. The age of a house says little about what is on its roof today, because roofs get re-covered, extended and patched over the decades, and only a survey shows which case you have.

Neighbouring places give a sense of the area we work in. Corntown is another, and the same survey-first routine applies in every one of these villages: we look over the roof and the room before any figure goes on paper.

Anyone applying for planning consent on an Ogmore-by-Sea house deals with Vale of Glamorgan Council. The village is outside every Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, so no landscape designation adds a rule of its own.

On a house, a rooflight can fall under permitted development provided it stays within limits on how far it projects, how high it rises and how it faces the boundary. Those limits are set out in the planning guide for skylights in Wales, and they are worth checking against your own roof before anything is ordered.

Some homes begin from a different position. Flats and maisonettes are left out of householder permitted development entirely. For houses, a council may withdraw those rights through an Article 4 direction, and a condition written into a house's first planning permission can do the same job. Where a house is listed, a rooflight that would change its special character needs listed building consent, which is applied for through the local planning authority and on which Cadw is consulted.

Where doubt remains, the council's planning team can be asked, and a Lawful Development Certificate from it settles the position formally. Getting one takes a little time up front, and you keep a document that a later buyer's solicitor will be glad to see.

Separate from planning is the Building Regulations question. Opening up a roof for a new rooflight generally brings approval into play, partly because the structure must carry the extra weight. Swapping a roof window for an equivalent one counts as building work as well, whereas a repair on its own does not. Where the work is notifiable, we deal with the notification through Vale of Glamorgan's building control team or a registered building control approver. Which of those two you prefer is up to you.

A bedroom roof window takes the worst of a blustery night. Manufacturers such as VELUX fit an integrated rain sensor to their solar and electric roof windows, so the sash shuts itself when rain starts, which helps if you leave the room aired and go out. Electric opening rooflights explains how the motor and controls fit together.

The bathroom is a different test. A roof window above the bath needs an extractor and a glazing choice to match. In an existing home, a new or replacement roof window should reach 1.4 W/m²K, or Window Energy Rating Band B, under Approved Document L (Wales). See roof windows for the opening types and VELUX windows for sizes and swaps.

Over a flat-roofed kitchen or garage extension, the glass lies almost flat to the sky. A flat roof rooflight with the right fall sheds water off its kerb, while a roof lantern sends it down pitched glass to the roof around. A rooflight in Wales should reach 2.2 W/m²K; for a lantern, we agree the figure with you at the visit.

Glass choice is its own conversation. VELUX offers a coating that repels dirt and a laminated inner pane whose job is to keep a broken pane from dropping into the room. What you can choose depends on which window and glazing variant you are looking at, so the choice is made after we have seen the roof and measured the opening.

A dim landing in the heart of a house is the place for a sun tunnel: a small dome on the roof, a reflective tube, and a diffuser in the ceiling below. Rain runs straight off a dome that size.

A clear pane and a dry sill the morning after a storm are what a good installation looks like. Older rooflights go wrong quietly. Mist between the panes of a unit usually means the seal has failed, and misted rooflights are among the units we replace, alongside new fittings. You get the free survey first and the fixed written quote after it, with the 10-year workmanship guarantee written down. Call 01792 929062 or book a survey online.