Architect Opinder Liddar shares his top tips and key considerations for making the most of a small site to build your ideal home

Above: This glass infill extension by Paul Archer Design (paularcher design.co.uk) provides additional floor space, freeing up room for an extra guest bed and bathroom in the main house. The space-saving design sensitively modernised the grade II-listed property and maximised access to natural light throughout

ANDY STAGG

These days, it can be difficult to find a self build site and the likelihood of locating a large, open plot with no incumbrance on design, is slim. It’s more likely that you’ll be looking at sites that are part of, or set amongst existing structures and which could, nonetheless, provide a great home in an ideal location, if the design is cleverly thought through.

While a tight site will present some constraints, once you’ve found the area you want to live in, you may well find that you can achieve a substantial home on what, at first glance, may look like a very small area of land. I’m exploring how to design for compact sites and what to look for when viewing potential plots.

Consider your impact on neighbouring amenity

For a scheme to be considered favourably by the local planning authority, your proposal must demonstrate that it won’t negatively impact on neighbouring amenity. This means that your new home must not overlook your neighbours’ property or private garden space.

Your design should not be imposing, so its scale will need to be in line with the buildings either side of it and you must make sure that there isn’t going to be any loss of light to the windows of surrounding habitable rooms.

Each local authority has a design guide that may set the distances that are permitted from one window to the next. It should also show how to calculate whether your proposal is likely to block out light. Make sure that you and your designer take steps to review such requirements, ideally before you commit to the site.