Single-storey, double-storey, rear and side extension drawings for Wigan homes — measured to Wigan Council's design guidance, delivered in days and revised free until your decision, with a free approval-odds check before you commit.
Wigan Council granted 89% of the householder planning decisions it made in its latest published year — 2 points above the 87% England-wide householder average. A large share of the borough is Green Belt, so extension and outbuilding scale is tightly held on affected plots away from the urban cores, which is where a policy-literate drawing pack earns its keep. Its dominant Victorian (1837–1901), Edwardian (1901–1910), interwar (1918–1939) and postwar (1945–1970) housing stock sets the design brief on most streets.
Class A and Class B set the thresholds — a rear dormer to 40m³ on a terrace or 50m³ on a semi or detached, and a single-storey rear extension to 3m on a terrace or 4m on a detached house — beyond which Wigan Council needs a full application. Wigan carries at least one Article 4 direction, and conservation areas including Wigan Town Centre, Wigan Pier and Standish remove those rights outright, so we confirm your exact address before a line is drawn. A validated householder application in Wigan is determined against an 8-week statutory target.
Standish (affluent commuter village with a conservation-area core mixing stone and brick with modern estates), Leigh (former cotton and mining town with canal heritage, dense terraces and a town-centre conservation area), Ashton-in-Makerfield (southern coalfield town of brick terraces and interwar suburban growth), Hindley (mining township of terraced streets with a town-centre conservation area), Tyldesley (former mill and mining town of brick terraces with a town-centre conservation area) and Haigh (semi-rural estate village adjoining Haigh Woodland Park with protected historic character) — these are the Wigan pockets our drawings cover most. Heritage designations here include Wigan Town Centre, Wigan Pier, Standish, Haigh Village, Leigh Town Centre and Tyldesley Town Centre. Wigan Council weighs each proposal against Places for Everyone (the Greater Manchester joint plan, effective March 2024) alongside the Wigan Local Plan Core Strategy and the emerging district Local Plan, where the former coalfield legacy of the Wigan Flashes and low-lying mossland brings ground-stability, contamination and ecology constraints to development sites. Converted terraced flats occur across the town centres of Wigan and Leigh, and those units carry no householder permitted-development rights.. On roofs the borough is Welsh slate on the Victorian and Edwardian brick terraces and interlocking concrete tile on the interwar and post-war semis, over Victorian and Edwardian coalfield and millworkers' red-brick terraces, interwar semis and council-estate housing and older stone cores in the estate villages.
Wigan homes come in a handful of recurring shapes, and each one points to a different extension. The borough is built largely from Victorian and Edwardian coalfield and millworkers' red-brick terraces, interwar semis and council-estate housing and older stone cores in the estate villages, so a Victorian terrace usually wants a rear or side-return infill, while an interwar semi has room for a wider single-storey wrap or a two-storey side addition. Wigan Council judges every one of them against Places for Everyone (the Greater Manchester joint plan, effective March 2024) alongside the Wigan Local Plan Core Strategy and the emerging district Local Plan, weighing footprint, height and the impact on the house next door before it looks at the elevations.
That is why the drawings decide the outcome. We set the extension depth against the permitted-development limits precisely, keep the eaves and ridge within the allowances, and plot the 45-degree daylight lines to the neighbours' windows so the case officer can see the amenity test is passed. A large share of the borough is Green Belt, so extension and outbuilding scale is tightly held on affected plots away from the urban cores, so we design around it from the first sketch rather than discover it at validation.
Wigan also protects whole streets — Wigan Town Centre, Wigan Pier, Standish, Haigh Village, Leigh Town Centre and Tyldesley Town Centre among them. Wigan's borough-wide Article 4 direction, in force from August 2025, removes permitted-development rights for the change of use from a house (C3) to a small HMO (C4), so all new HMOs now need planning permission, and localised conservation-area directions add further householder controls. On designated land the larger-home extension route and most side extensions stop being permitted development, so we confirm your address against those layers before drawing a line.
Plenty of Wigan extensions are permitted development and need no planning application — a single-storey rear extension within the depth and height limits is the common case. You will normally need to apply to Wigan Council if any of these apply:
We draw the footprint, the ridge and eaves heights and the neighbours' daylight on the page — the relationships Wigan Council's officers weigh first — and submit a validation-complete pack, whether that is a lawful development certificate, a prior-approval notification or a full householder application.
Below is Wigan Council's real householder decision record, drawn from official planning statistics and refreshed as new data lands. Wigan approves close to nine in ten planning applications, with its extensive Green Belt, former-coalfield ground conditions and canal-side conservation areas the main constraints on householder schemes. A complete, policy-literate extension pack anticipates those pressure points before submission, which is why professionally drawn applications are decided faster and refused less often than DIY ones.
Source: MHCLG planning application statistics (householder decisions, England, 1 April 2025 - 31 March 2026). Compare every borough on our London approval-rate league table.
Tell us about your project and get a fixed, no-obligation quote back within one working day. If you don't need planning permission at all, we'll tell you that too — for free.
Across Standish, Leigh and Ashton-in-Makerfield, the extension that lands most often is the single-storey rear addition — a glazed kitchen-diner across the back of the house, kept within the permitted-development depth or taken to a full application where the ground floor wants more. On the borough's victorian and edwardian coalfield and millworkers' red-brick terraces, a side-return infill frequently pairs with it to square off the plan; on wider older stone cores in the estate villages, a two-storey side or rear extension can add a bedroom above without swallowing the garden.
The former coalfield legacy of the Wigan Flashes and low-lying mossland brings ground-stability, contamination and ecology constraints to development sites. We size the extension to the amenity and daylight tests, match the roof and materials to the host house, and keep enough garden to satisfy Wigan Council's space standards — so the scheme answers the borough's questions before an objection can raise them. Where permitted-development rights are used up or removed, we prepare the householder application to the council's extension design guidance instead.
We draw extensions on every street in the borough. A few of the neighbourhoods where Wigan projects come up most often:
Extension drawings for Standish's affluent commuter village with a conservation-area core mixing stone and brick with modern estates — footprint-checked, daylight-tested and drawn to Wigan Council's guidance.
Extension drawings for Leigh's former cotton and mining town with canal heritage, dense terraces and a town-centre conservation area — footprint-checked, daylight-tested and drawn to Wigan Council's guidance.
Extension drawings for Ashton-in-Makerfield's southern coalfield town of brick terraces and interwar suburban growth — footprint-checked, daylight-tested and drawn to Wigan Council's guidance.
Extension drawings for Hindley's mining township of terraced streets with a town-centre conservation area — footprint-checked, daylight-tested and drawn to Wigan Council's guidance.
Extension drawings for Tyldesley's former mill and mining town of brick terraces with a town-centre conservation area — footprint-checked, daylight-tested and drawn to Wigan Council's guidance.
Extension drawings for Haigh's semi-rural estate village adjoining Haigh Woodland Park with protected historic character — footprint-checked, daylight-tested and drawn to Wigan Council's guidance.
The right extension in Wigan depends on your house type and how much garden you can give up. This is how the main options compare on planning route and what they add.
| Extension type | Permitted development? | What it adds | What Wigan Council checks |
|---|---|---|---|
| Single-storey rear | Often, within 3m/4m depth (6m/8m via prior approval) | Bigger kitchen-diner across the back | Depth, height, neighbour daylight (45°) |
| Side-return infill | Sometimes, if within width and height limits | Squares off an L-shaped ground floor | Width vs the original house, glazing to boundary |
| Two-storey rear/side | No — full application | Extra bedroom or bathroom above | Bulk, overlooking, 7m rear-boundary gap |
| Wraparound (rear + side) | No — full application | Whole-width open-plan ground floor | Combined footprint and garden retained |
Route depends on your street — conservation areas such as Wigan Town Centre and Wigan Pier and Article 4 directions can remove permitted-development rights.
A fixed process built around how Wigan Council validates and decides householder extension applications — most drawings are submission-ready within seven days of survey.
Tell us your Wigan postcode and house type. We confirm your conservation and Article 4 status, how much permitted-development depth you have left, and score your odds against live Wigan Council decisions.
We measure the existing footprint, floor and eaves levels, boundary distances and the neighbours' window positions — the numbers the depth limits and daylight tests depend on.
Chartered designers develop the single-storey, two-storey or side extension to your brief, drawn inside the permitted-development limits or to Wigan Council's extension design guidance.
We submit the certificate, prior-approval notice or application, manage validation and case-officer queries, and revise the drawings free until Wigan Council issues its decision.
Not always. A single-storey rear extension up to 3 metres deep on a terrace or semi, or 4 metres on a detached house, and no higher than 4 metres, is usually permitted development. In Wigan you will need to apply to Wigan Council for two-storey extensions, side extensions wider than half the house, anything forward of the front wall, deeper rear extensions under the larger-home prior-approval route, and any extension in a conservation area such as Wigan Town Centre and Wigan Pier.
Standard permitted development allows 3 metres on a terraced or semi-detached house and 4 metres on a detached one. The larger-home extension scheme can double that to 6 or 8 metres, but it needs a prior-approval notification to Wigan Council and a neighbour-consultation period, and it does not apply on designated land such as Wigan's conservation areas. We confirm which route your property qualifies for before drawing.
Two-storey and double-storey extensions almost always need a full householder application to Wigan Council, because they fall outside permitted development on most homes. The council looks closely at bulk, overlooking of neighbours and the 7-metre gap a two-storey rear extension must keep from the rear boundary. We design to those tests and show the daylight and privacy angles on the drawings.
A householder planning application in Wigan runs to a statutory eight-week target, a larger-home prior-approval notification to around six weeks including the neighbour-consultation period, and a lawful development certificate to eight weeks. Incomplete submissions stall at validation, so we submit a complete pack and manage officer queries to keep the decision on schedule. Wigan Council is the decision-maker.
Yes — planning permission and building regulations are separate consents, and almost every extension needs both. Planning governs whether you can build it; building control governs how it is built, covering structure, insulation, drainage and fire safety. We prepare the building-regulations drawings alongside the planning set so Wigan Council's building control or an approved inspector can sign the work off.
Every house and brief is different, so we price each Wigan extension individually and send a fixed, no-obligation quote back within one working day. It covers the full drawing pack with free revisions until Wigan Council approves, and we tell you upfront whether your extension qualifies as permitted development. Call 020 7864 7245 to get started.
Answer five quick questions and get a free planning score for your exact address — instantly. Then, if you want the full picture, unlock the detailed analysis: your council's live approval rates, local precedents, constraints on your street and a step-by-step route to permission.
Same fixed quotes, same fast drawings — wherever your project is.