Find the right window for your house
Oxted, Woldingham, Lingfield and the villages around them
Start with the age of the house and the windows it was built with. The right frame usually follows.
Old cottages and farmhouses
Small openings, deep reveals and walls that are rarely straight. A heavy frame shows badly here. Timber, or a slim flush casement where the planning allows, keeps the look. Check whether the building is listed before anything else.
Victorian and Edwardian houses
Mostly built after the railway reached Oxted in 1884. Many have sashes, others casements with tile-hanging or render above. Copy the meeting rail, the bar pattern and the sill, and choose sashes where the house had sashes.
Interwar semis and detached houses
Bays, leaded lights and sometimes steel windows. Flush casements suit them well, and steel-look aluminium is a lovely match for houses that once had steel frames.
Post-war and later houses
Wide openings and simple casements. Slimline aluminium gives the most glass; chamfered or flush uPVC is the best value. Keep the opening parts in line across the house.
Talk through the options for your house at a free visit.
Weather, light and upkeep
Houses on the slopes of the North Downs and the ridge at Woldingham catch more wind and driving rain than those in the valley. Ask for the exposed sides of the house to be looked at separately; the frames and seals can differ from one side to the other.
Shaded garden walls under trees stay damp for longer, so check the sills there. If cleaning upstairs windows is awkward, tilt-and-turn or easy-clean hinges help.
Painted timber wants its first repaint after about three years and regular repainting after that. That job falls to the homeowner, because the installer doesn't offer a repainting service.
Material in a sentence
Aluminium: the slimmest frames, any colour, no painting, cheaper than real timber. uPVC: the best value, warm and quiet, with woodgrain and colours. Timber: for listed and protected buildings, or for love of wood.
Read next: Aluminium windows · uPVC windows · Window prices
