Turn disused, agricultural out buildings into lavish home set in the country side
Barn Conversions
Barn conversions make amazing places to live if the design works with the character and the existing structure, and if you’re in a position to create one of your own in the Manchester area, CK Architectural can help. If you are lucky enough to have bought a countryside building to convert into a beautiful new home, planning laws have relaxed, and it is now easier to create character rich warm homes in rural areas.
Barns vary in size but generally are long rectangular buildings, which gives us architectural designers a big job to do in making modern living spaces. With the right vision, inspiration, and skill, however, it’s more than possible to create a residential marvel and form a modern, stylish and liveable building that is perfect for any lifestyle.
As expert architectural designers, we’re always working on ways to develop spaces into reaching their full potential. Contact us today for a free consultation on your own barn conversion project, and we’ll give all the information that we can on how CK Architectural Manchester can help you create a building like no other.
Pre Design Considerations
As with all new build designs, you need to consider impact, amenity, utilities, access, services and ventilation. Then, it needs to get passed through building regulations. The size, orientation and outlook will be the key factors in designing a barn into a modern living space.
A barn is typically a long building, so through rooms are not always avoidable, but with high apex roofs, you can create wonderful open mezzanines and galleries that can create amazement in any space.
Insulation will typically be formed within the fabric of the building, leaving the existing structure as an external finish. All additional openings, windows and roof lights will be in keeping with the original building – white PVC windows within a brick and timber structure won’t look tasteful.
Design Options & Preferences
When creating the right design for your barn conversion, you will need to decide how many rooms you want, and which rooms need orientating to the best outlook.
Generally, the space you have available is the size of the outer walls, with some deduction for the new insulated internals. Once the rooms are laid out, access, hallways, toilets, en-suites and the all-important glazing can be worked out.
Split levels can be a great feature too. Sometimes you can make up in height what you may not have in floor area and create an incredible design this way.
Barn conversions usually face stiff opposition from the local authority and local residents because of farm building protection, open countryside development restrictions, infrastructure and sustainability etc. However, the new Barn Conversion clause authorises a change of use of a building and any land immediately surrounding it from use as an agricultural building to a dwelling. It also authorises building operations ‘reasonably’ necessary to convert the building to residential use.
The site must have been used solely for agricultural use and have existed as a barn by 20th March 2013. New barns can be built and converted into homes but must exist as solely agricultural buildings for at least 10 years. The total floor space of your barn to be converted must be no more than 450m². If the barn is bigger, you’ll only be able to convert to a maximum of 450m². The 450m² can be divided into three separate dwellings. The local authority will take into consideration the impact on transport, noise, contamination, flood risk and whether the location or siting of the building is suitable to be changed from agricultural use to residential use.
Barn conversions are subject to the same rules as any new build. You will need to provide the following:
- SAP calculations, this will design the energy efficiency of the home and give requirements for insulation and heating performance.
- Disposal of waste and drainage, access.
- The building will need to be assessed for structural stability
- Sound testing will be required on completion but all construction elements affecting sound need to be detailed and built-in accordance with approved plans.
- All other documents of the building regulations will need to be checked via full plans approval prior to commencing.
Find out more about the Building Regulations Process.
After addressing all of this carefully, we will provide you with a detailed set of building regulation drawings that will allow you to tender if you wish and give you a guide for the build.
From that point, you can move forward with your barn conversion project to choose a builder to carry out the work as you see fit, or alternatively, carry out a project management service like ours where we’ll do this for you and manage the whole thing.
Book your call today
In our calls, you’ll chat with a friendly member of our design team. We’ll cover everything about your project, like the project brief, budget, design limitations, and advice on planning and building regulations, and much more.
