*** Please give all the original stuff you take out to the Barbican Salvage Store ***
Useful pages
OVERVIEW
HANDLING ALTERATIONS PROPERLY
OFFICIAL HOME IMPROVEMENT PACK
DEALING WITH UNAPPROVED ALTERATIONS
THE BARBICAN SALVAGE STORE
PEOPLE WHO CAN HELP YOU
This page explains how to do alterations in a legal – and civilized – way. Please don’t let your builders talk you into doing hugely noisy and disruptive work. They walk away; you have to live with your neighbours.
The other page on the menu is mainly for buyers who discover that alterations have been carried out by their sellers without the necessary permissions. It tells you why it’s important and what to do about it.
Please don’t be EVIL
You’ve bought your Barbican flat because you like the Barbican, and you want to enjoy living here. We want you to be happy here too. Like most new residents, we are sure you won’t want to start off by making enemies of all your neighbours. Some thoughtless people do.
There is a big issue – NOISE!
Barbican blocks are concrete buildings. All building works are likely to be audible in other flats to some extent, and there may be short periods of loud noise. Of course we are all reasonable people, so we understand that. But jack-hammering into the concrete walls and ceilings is a totally different level of noise problem.
The noise is indescribable – far beyond the drilling required to attach new kitchen or bathroom units, which we grin and bear. The operatives have to wear special headphones to avoid damage to their hearing. Can you imagine what it’s like for the resident on the other side of the wall? It is not an issue of inconvenience; it is a serious issue of stress and damage to health.
And there is absolutely no need for it! There are many other alternatives if you want extra sockets. Dry lining a wall, with the cables in the air space behind the plasterboard – you lose an inch. Cables in surface-mounted metal tubing along the top of the skirting – in keeping with Brutalist sensibility. And anyway we should care about causing pain and suffering to our neighbours.
Channelling into walls is irreversible. It runs the risk of weakening the web of reinforced steel rebars which hold the concrete structure together, and that is dangerous to the building as a whole.
Unscrupulous builders might sell you on the idea of a lovely dropped ceiling with recessed lights and ceiling speakers, without mentioning that they intend to use jackhammers and drills for weeks on end to achieve it. This is because the walls and ceilings are concrete, and channelling cables into the walls is a very hard job – not like digging into plaster.
When this happens, your neighbours are literally driven out of their flats by the indescribable noise. This is made worse by the fact that builders sometimes do it completely haphazardly, without notice – almost as if they’re intending to inflict deliberate torture.
If you are the client, no one is going to understand that you had no intention of inflicting this on your future neighbours, it was all down to your builders, you couldn’t help it, you are appalled … etc. etc. You will be glared at in the lift for years.
So, please do not give your builders a free rein to manage everything. Usually that means simply ignoring the pleas of distressed neighbours – or even issuing legal threats to distraught and vulnerable people – because some builders are often only concerned with their own business needs. Builders move onto other jobs. You’re left living with the consequences and resentments. Remember: It is your project. The builders are only your ‘servants’ in carrying it out. In law and, quite rightly, in the eyes of your neighbours, you are personally responsible for whatever is done to your neighbours in your name.
So please be considerate and thoughtful. Do not do works which require jack-hammering. Make sure any hammering work is grouped together to get it over quickly and only carried out during business hours.
Then your welcome when you move in should be like this …
Listed building consent
It can be a criminal offence to carry out work requiring listed building consent without authority, so consult a surveyor or check with the City Corporation before going ahead.Landlord's consent
Under the terms of your lease, you have to get written permission from the Barbican Estate Office before carrying out any alterations which affect the structure (including any fixings to walls) or any alterations to the kitchen and bathroom. You should send them a description of the proposed works and a 'before and after' sketch plan or drawing. You'll need a 'licence' approving the works before you start; and a letter after the works are completed approving the way they were done.Building regulation consent
You may also need Building Regulations Approval from Building Control at the City Corporation. Their role is to check that work is carried out properly. If Building Regulations Approval is required, you must get a letter from them when the works have been completed, confirming they comply with building regulations.Retrospective consent
If when you come to sell, it turns out that you don't have the necessary consents - e.g. you didn't get consent when you took out your Garchey or when you laid wood flooring - then you will have to get 'retrospective consent' or else undo the works. Don't take it for granted. You may be in trouble if you have done work requiring listed building consent without permission.
If you have done work which the City Corporation as landlord wouldn't have approved at the time, they won't approve it later. In fact, you could be worse off - if their attitude has changed, then they may refuse retrospective permission later for work they might have approved at the time.
If your work involves altering or installing pipework or connecting into (or capping off) communal conduits, they make you open up the wall to prove the work was done right.
Barbican rules and tips
The Barbican Estate Office have rules on doing alterations - the hours when your builders can drill - and 'tips' - so your carpet installer doesn't put a nail through the under-floor heating. You can get a copy from them.
Salvage store
Many of the features of Barbican flats are absolutely unique to the Barbican and they aren’t manufactured any longer, so the only way of getting one is from someone else’s flat. Conservation-minded residents had the excellent idea of setting up the Barbican Salvage Group. The idea is to save original fixtures and fittings, so when residents want to restore or replace features in their flats, they will be able to do so. If you are thinking of renovating your flat, please get in touch with the group so they can collect the stuff you are going to be throwing out.Repairs
Changing bathroom suites
The listed building guidance rather unhelpfully says that “listed building consent is not normally required to change the bath, toilet, sinks or taps in your bathroom”. It doesn’t tell us what the abnormal situation requiring consent would be. But basically it seems that you can change all fittings, and install a shower instead of a bath, without needing listed building consent.
Clause 4 (6) of the standard Barbican lease requires that the flat owner will “not … remove any of the landlord's fixtures without the previous consent in writing of [the landlord".
All fitted kitchen or bathroom units, sinks, the Garchey system, basins, toilets and fittings are ‘landlord’s fixtures’.)
So you do need to get the Barbican Estate Office’s consent under the lease for changes, such as replacing sinks, baths and cabinets, and you may need building regulation approval for any changes to the plumbing.
Clause 4(5) of the Barbican lease says the flat owner must “renew or replace at any time … all landlord’s fixtures fittings and appurtenances in the premises which may be or have become beyond repair”.
So changing taps or shower fittings, for example, which wear out or cease to function properly would not require the Barbican Estate Office’s consent
Any works which involve altering the plumbing within the flat does not require building regulation approval. But any works which affect the stack or pipework within the common parts, or the connections to them, do require building regulation approval.
Retiling the bathroom
Original Barbican bathrooms are completely tiled in white tiles, with some specially moulded ones round the bath. These aren't specifically mentioned in the section of the listed building guidance, dealing with changes to bathroom suites. But the guidance does say that you can “install a shower instead of the bath”, and since you couldn't replace the bath without mucking up the tiles, it would seem that changing the tiles does not require listed building consent.
It would seem that it also does not require the Barbican Estate Office’s consent under the lease, because tiling is not a landlord's fixture (unlike the bath and the basin) and the restrictions on alterations in the lease do not apply to internal non-structural works of this sort.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes (but not for retiling only).
- Building regulation approval: No, unless altertions or connections to the communal ducts and pipe work are involved.
- Listed building consent: Depends on the exact proposed changes.
Wooden flooring v carpets
Clause 4(5)(e) of the Barbican lease says the owner must “carpet all the floors in the premises from wall to wall”. The City broke that one themselves, because all the flats originally came with tiled bathroom floors and lino on the kitchen floors (although toilets did originally have carpets).
The Barbican Estate Office's policy now is that they won't actually give consent for wooden flooring, but equally they won't take action to require you to take it up again, unless they have a complaint from a neighbour about noise. So there is still the risk that you might have to put down carpeting.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Strictly yes, but they may turn a blind eye until there is a complaint.
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: No
Wooden flooring v carpets
Clause 4(5)(e) of the Barbican lease says the owner must “carpet all the floors in the premises from wall to wall”. The City broke that one themselves, because all the flats originally came with tiled bathroom floors and lino on the kitchen floors (although toilets did originally have carpets).
The Barbican Estate Office's policy now is that they won't actually give consent for wooden flooring, but equally they won't take action to require you to take it up again, unless they have a complaint from a neighbour about noise. So there is still the risk that you might have to put down carpeting.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Strictly yes, but they may turn a blind eye until there is a complaint.
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: No
Internal doors. You can paint the internal doors as well.
The entrance door. Clause 4 (6) of the standard Barbican lease says that the owner shall “not decorate the exterior of the premises (including the exterior of any entrance door) … without the previous consent in writing of the [Barbican Estate Office].” So you can paint the inside, but you can't paint the outside of the entrance door. That has to be a consistent colour for the block, arranged by the Barbican Estate Office. They repaint every few years and the colour is usually chosen by a ballot of the residents of the block.
Walls. You can repaint and paper the walls of you flat in any way you want.
Window frames. For the same reason, you can re-varnish the interior of the frames of windows and frames, but you can't paint or varnish the exterior of the window frames, which is done for all flats periodically by the Barbican Estate.
(The listed building guidance says that owners are “encouraged” to retain the original hardwood finish of the interior window frames.)
Summary - Internal, like-for-like redecoration works require:
- Landlord’s consent: No.
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: No
Replacing internal doors
You need listed building consent to replace any internal doors or partitions (including the sliding sections which many flats have in the kitchen area), and also to put in any new partitions or doors.
This may also require the consent of the landlord under the Barbican lease. It would not require building regulation consent.
If all you want to do is to repair a damaged door, you still technically require listed building consent. The planners will normally require you to ensure that the repairs are carried out so that the result is consistent with the original (in other words, so you can’t tell the difference).
You can't use a 'repair' as a back-door way of replacing the original with a door which is more to your taste.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Possibly
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Yes
Electrics
Building regulations approval is required for rewiring the flat or for any other electrical work.
Alternatively, a certificate of compliance by a suitably qualified electrician can replace the need for the usual building regulation consent from the council.
Works cannot be carried out to any electrical services which are common to the building because those belong to the estate.
Listed building consent and landlord’s consent are not required. No consent is needed to change any of the electrical fittings – e.g. light switches.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: No
- Building regulation approval: Yes, but your contractor may be able to self-certify.
- Listed building consent: No
Floors
Owners are not allowed to do any works at all to the floor involving tacks, nails or screws, including fixing down the strips to attach the carpets to. Clause 4(6) requires that the flat owner will “not … insert or drive nails or screws or sink plugs or make any fixing whatsoever to the floor of the premises.”
The very good reason for this is that you could pierce your flat’s under-floor heating pipes, which lie just under the surface of the concrete screed. Unfortunately, once under-floor heating has ceased to function, there's no easy way to renew it.
(See 'Carpets' for wooden floors)
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Depends on the nature of the works.
The Garchey system
Originally, every flat was connected to the garchey system (the estate-wide system for disposing of some rubbish via the kitchen sink). If you want to take it out, you need permission from the Barbican Estate Office under the terms of the Barbican lease, and it must be done in an approved manner, supervised by them.
It's a technical thing, which normal plumbers won't necessarily know how to do properly.
Colin Iffland, the Garchey Manager, has been dealing with the system for many years (and his father before him, I believe) and can advise on any garchey issues.
You don't need listed building consent or building regulation approval to take out the garchey.
In the past, many flat owners have taken their garchey out - with or without the Barbican Estate Office’s consent. It's got to the stage now that if any more were to be taken out, it might jeopardise the functioning of the entire system. I believe no consent will now be given to remove garcheys from tower block flats.
If you have trouble with a disconnected garchey because smells blow back through the system, the Barbican Estate Office can handle that for you by adding a gizmo to the pipework. This operates a bit like the U-bend in a toilet to prevent smells from the system getting back into the flat.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: No
Changing the immersion heater
You do not need any consents. In fact, the Barbican lease specifically requires you to replace equipment which fails. Clause 4(5) of the Barbican lease says the flat owner must “renew or replace at any time … all landlord’s fixtures fittings and appurtenances in the premises which may be or have become beyond repair”.
The Barbican Estate Office do give general guidance. The replacement must be able to withstand at least the same head of water pressure as the existing heater. The water heater to the kitchen is normally fed by mains water pressure, and must be vented separately. The current arrangement is that it vents through the taps to the sink. You mustn’t fit an unvented water heater.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: No
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: No
Changing the fitted kitchen units
Clause 4 (6) of the standard Barbican lease requires that the flat owner will “not … remove any of the landlord's fixtures without the previous consent in writing of [the landlord]. (All fitted kitchen or bathroom units, sinks, the garchey system, basins, toilets and fittings are ‘landlord’s fixtures’.)
So, under the terms of the Barbican lease, you do need the Barbican Estate Office’s consent to strip out or replace the kitchen units, cabinets, sinks and worktops, but you don't need building regulation approval. The listed building guidance confirms that you also don't need listed building consent. No consent is required to change kitchen appliances.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: No
Planters on the balcony
Putting plant pots and tables and chairs on the balcony doesn't require any consent, but there are some qualifications to this. Although the balcony may be included in the premises you own, your lease says you must keep it clear of obstruction, because the balcony also serves as part of the fire escape for everyone on your floor.
Clause (2) of the Sixth Schedule of the standard Barbican lease says “The tenant will not obstruct any balcony forming part of the premises (including any dividing doors or screens), nor place anything there which might be or become a danger, nor do or permit anything which might impede escape from the premises or other premises in case of fire or other emergency”
You are not allowed to get rid of the standard Barbican window boxes and planters. They are covered by the listing of the Barbican just as much as the structure of the buildings themselves. If a planter is broken, you can replace it by getting an identical copy from the Barbican Estate Office.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes for changing the planters, or any other external changes.
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Yes for changing the planters, or any other external changes.
Plumbing
You have to get approval under the Barbican lease from the Barbican Estate Office for new plumbing, including pipework which is actually in your flat, and which exclusively serves your flat. You also need building regulation approval.
No work can be carried out to any plumbing services which are common to the building. Those belong to the estate.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: Yes
- Listed building consent: Usually not, but it would depend on the nature of the changes.
Satellite dishes
Putting up a satellite dish, or anything else to the exterior of the building, would require the landlord’s consent under the lease. Clause (9) of the Sixth Schedule of the Barbican lease says: “The [flat owner] will not … place or fix or suffer to be placed or fixed upon the exterior of the premises any wireless or television aerial.” Listed building consent would be required. The listed building guidance says that such alterations are “discouraged” and would only be given consent in “very special individual circumstances”. It's not clear what those might be.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: You need to check.
- Listed building consent: Yes
Removing the skirting boards
Every flat has a distinctive tiny skirting board, almost let into the wall. You actually can't cut that out without first getting listed building consent and the Barbican Estate Office’s consent. They regard that as an important feature of the flats to be protected, so you won't get consent for it.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Yes
Removing sliding screens
You need the landlord's consent, but not building regulation consent. It will require listed building consent to remove or alter any internal walls or partitions in your flat, such as those to your kitchen or living area, or the removal of bedroom walls to create a larger living area.
This includes sliding doors and partitions. Each case is judged individually on its own merits. You will also need listed building consent to erect any new internal partition wall.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Yes
Altering stairs
You need the landlord's consent, but not building regulation consent. The duplex type of flat has an internal staircase. The City’s planners responsible for listed building consents will almost certainly refuse any application to change or replace that.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Yes
Glazing a terrace
Putting a glazed roof on a roof terrace, or adding glazing to make your terrace into a kind of conservatory, would definitely require listed building consent and landlord's consent under the Barbican lease. The Barbican lease itself is quite lax on this. Most modern leases would absolutely forbid any works to the exterior or structure of a flat, but the Barbican lease only says that any external or structural works require the landlords’ consent - and if the works would be an ‘improvement’, they can only refuse consent on reasonable grounds.
Some did slip through in the past before the Barbican was listed - you can make out a few of them on the outline of the tower blocks - but the planners would now almost certainly refuse listed building consent for any such works. The listed building guidance says: “Individual alterations to the roof line or frontages of buildings and balconies would disturb the appearance of the whole building and are therefore unlikely to be acceptable. Such an alteration requires listed building consent and planning permission and would normally be resisted.”
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: Yes
- Listed building consent: Yes. Also planning permission. Good luck trying.
The ventilation/extraction system
Most Barbican flats are provided with a ventilation/extraction system designed to take stale air out of the kitchen and bathroom areas where there are no windows. This is a communal system for the building. Legally you can't carry out any works to the system itself because that lies behind the walls of the flat and belongs to the estate.
The Barbican lease does not deal explicitly with internal works to the communal ventilation/extraction system. The nearest reference is that clause 4(6) says that the flat owner shall “not … cut injure alter or divide the premises or any part thereof”.
But the Barbican Estate Office position is that flat owners must obtain their approval before they replace or cover up the extraction vents because flat owners’ works can create an imbalance in the system.
It is a balanced system and if individual flat owners muck about with their end of it, it can make the system work less effectively for the rest of the block, and even lead to smells being blown into flats, not just extracted out of them.
Works to the ventilation/extraction system are not mentioned in the listed building guidance. So, for any work carried out since 2001, there should either be a listed building consent or written confirmation from the City that it was not required.
If the ventilation has been closed off without touching the vents and equipment itself (by sticking a cupboard in front of it, for example) the Barbican Estate Office would still expect to be consulted (for the reasons already explained). But you don't need listed building consent or building regulation consent to put something in front of a vent in that way.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: Yes
- Listed building consent: Possibly, depending on nature of the work.
Removing, adding or altering walls or sliding screens
You need the landlord's consent, but not building regulation consent.
It will require listed building consent to remove or alter any internal walls or partitions in your flat, such as those to your kitchen or living area, or the removal of bedroom walls to create a larger living area.
This includes sliding doors and partitions. Each case is judged individually on its own merits.
You will also need listed building consent to erect any new internal partition wall.
You cannot make any holes in the concrete walls, or even cut channels for wiring. Although re-wiring does not strictly require consent, you still have to operate within the existing conduits.
Therefore, most new wiring will have to be in surface mounted cables.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: No
- Listed building consent: Yes
Changing windows
Listed building consent - and, in fact, planning permission as a separate item as well - would be required to replace external windows. You would be unlikely to get consent. The listed building guidance says: “Consent [to replace windows] would only be granted in the most unusual circumstances. Any alterations to windows, such as secondary glazing, will require consent and each case would be judge on its merits.”
If you want to add secondary glazing in a way which is fixed to the window, that would also require listed building consent and the landlord’s consent under the lease.
Summary - These works require:
- Landlord’s consent: Yes
- Building regulation approval: Yes. The glazing has to be certified as complying.
- Listed building consent: Yes. Also planning permission.