Laser-accurate existing drawings of your Kensington and Chelsea property — floor plans, elevations and sections measured on site and drawn to millimetre tolerance, so every design, planning application and lease that follows starts from a base that is actually right, delivered in days.
the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea granted 85% of the householder planning decisions it made in its latest published year — 2 points below the 87% England-wide householder average. The borough runs the strictest basement policy in London — broadly one storey deep, under no more than half the garden, with a construction traffic management plan, which is where a policy-literate drawing pack earns its keep. Its dominant Georgian (1714–1837) and Victorian (1837–1901) housing stock sets the design brief on most streets.
Under Class B, a rear dormer stays permitted development up to 40m³ of added roof volume on a terrace or 50m³ on a semi-detached or detached house, while Class A allows a single-storey rear extension of 3m beyond the original rear wall on a terrace and 4m on a detached house before a full application is needed. Kensington and Chelsea carries at least one Article 4 direction, and conservation areas including Chelsea, Kensington and Holland Park remove those rights outright, so we confirm your exact address before a line is drawn. A validated householder application in Kensington and Chelsea is determined against an 8-week statutory target.
Chelsea (stucco terraces and mews streets off the King's Road), Kensington (grand stucco terraces and mansion blocks), Notting Hill (the Ladbroke Estate's stucco terraces around communal garden squares), Holland Park (large detached villas and substantial mansion flats), Knightsbridge (red-brick mansion blocks and stucco terraces) and Earls Court (tall Victorian terraces widely subdivided into flats) — these are the Kensington and Chelsea pockets our drawings cover most. Heritage designations here include Chelsea, Kensington, Holland Park, Ladbroke and Brompton. the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea weighs each proposal against the RBKC Consolidated Local Plan and the Basements SPD, where with the roofscape closely protected, mansard and roof additions are judged against the prevailing profile of each terrace group. Subdivided period houses are common around Earls Court and Notting Hill, and converted flats hold no householder permitted-development rights.. On roofs the borough is concealed butterfly roofs behind the terrace parapets and mansard roofs added to the stucco terraces, over stucco-fronted Georgian and Victorian terraces, purpose-built mansion blocks and mews houses behind the main streets.
Every proposed drawing is really two drawings — the house as it is, and the house as it will be — and the second is only as good as the first. A measured survey captures the property as-built: room sizes, wall thicknesses, window and door positions, floor-to-floor heights, ceiling lines and the outside envelope, all cross-checked so the plans, elevations and sections agree. Kensington and Chelsea's stucco-fronted Georgian and Victorian terraces, purpose-built mansion blocks and mews houses behind the main streets are rarely square or standard — walls lean, floors step, bays and returns hide behind later work — so measuring by hand off an old estate-agent plan simply carries the errors forward.
We survey with a laser measure and, on larger or more complex Kensington and Chelsea buildings, a scanner that captures a point cloud — millions of measured points the drawings are traced from — so nothing is estimated. The output is a clean set of scaled as-existing drawings, delivered in CAD, that an architect, engineer or lease-plan draughtsman can work straight into. The borough runs the strictest basement policy in London — broadly one storey deep, under no more than half the garden, with a construction traffic management plan, and an accurate existing set is what lets the proposed scheme answer that without a mid-project surprise.
Period and listed stock — the kind found across Chelsea, Kensington, Holland Park, Ladbroke and Brompton and Kensington and Chelsea's other conservation areas — is exactly where survey accuracy matters most, because heritage detail, irregular geometry and past alterations all have to be recorded faithfully. Almost the entire borough falls within a conservation area, and Article 4 directions strip out permitted-development rights so even minor external changes on the Ladbroke or Chelsea streets need consent. We capture the fabric as it really is so the record stands up to scrutiny.
A measured survey is worth its cost whenever an accurate existing record matters. For Kensington and Chelsea properties that usually means one of these:
We measure the whole property on site — plans, elevations, sections, floor-to-floor heights and the external envelope — and deliver a clean, scaled as-existing CAD set that your architect, engineer or lease draughtsman can build straight onto, so no one is re-measuring halfway through the Kensington and Chelsea project.
Below is the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea's real householder decision record, drawn from official planning statistics and refreshed as new data lands. The Royal Borough grants a fair share of householder applications but under exacting design control, with borough-wide conservation status and its restrictive basement policy the defining constraints. A measured survey never appears in these figures, but it sits behind the applications that do — an accurate existing set is the difference between a scheme that is decided on merit and one queried because the drawings do not add up.
Source: MHCLG planning application statistics (householder decisions, rolling year). 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.
The deliverable is a coordinated set: existing floor plans for every level, elevations of each face, and at least one section cut through the building to show floor-to-floor and ceiling heights — the dimension a plan alone can never carry. Everything is drawn to a stated scale and tolerance and issued as CAD, so it drops straight into the next stage. Across Chelsea, Kensington and Notting Hill, the buildings that most reward this are the large and altered ones, where a wrong assumption about a wall or a level costs a redesign later.
With the roofscape closely protected, mansard and roof additions are judged against the prevailing profile of each terrace group. We cross-check every dimension on site so the plans, elevations and sections agree with each other and with the real Kensington and Chelsea building — the discipline that stops a proposed extension being drawn against a wall that is not where the old plan said it was.
We survey houses, flats and mixed-use buildings across the borough. A few of the Kensington and Chelsea neighbourhoods where measured surveys come up most often:
Measured surveys of Chelsea's stucco terraces and mews streets off the King's Road — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Kensington's grand stucco terraces and mansion blocks — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Notting Hill's the Ladbroke Estate's stucco terraces around communal garden squares — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Holland Park's large detached villas and substantial mansion flats — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Knightsbridge's red-brick mansion blocks and stucco terraces — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Earls Court's tall Victorian terraces widely subdivided into flats — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
A full survey records the property in three dimensions, not one. This is what each output gives and what it is used for.
| Output | What it records | Used for | Typical method |
|---|---|---|---|
| Existing floor plans | Room sizes, wall thicknesses, openings | Design, planning, lease plans | Laser measure |
| Elevations | Each external face, window positions, heights | Planning applications, heritage | Laser & photo |
| Sections | Floor-to-floor and ceiling heights | Loft, structural, headroom checks | Laser & scan |
| Point cloud | Millions of measured points | Complex or large buildings | 3D laser scanner |
On period and listed stock around Chelsea and Kensington, a point-cloud survey records irregular Kensington and Chelsea fabric that hand measurement would miss.
A fixed process built around getting the existing record right first time — most as-existing sets are delivered within five days of the site visit.
Tell us the Kensington and Chelsea property type and what the survey is for. We confirm what you need — plans only, or plans, elevations and sections — and whether a scan is worth it for the building's size or complexity.
A surveyor measures the whole property with a laser measure and, where useful, a 3D scanner — every room, the external envelope, floor-to-floor heights and the awkward corners an old plan glosses over.
We draw up the coordinated existing plans, elevations and sections to a stated scale and tolerance and issue them as CAD, ready for the next stage of your Kensington and Chelsea project.
You get the full set in CAD and PDF, and we answer any query from the architect, engineer or the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea that follows — the survey is the base everything else is checked against.
No — a measured survey is simply an accurate record of the property as it stands, so it needs no permission from the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and involves no building work. It is the step before any application: the as-existing drawings it produces become the base for the proposed scheme you later submit. Many Kensington and Chelsea projects go wrong precisely because they skip it and design onto an inaccurate old floorplan instead.
They answer completely different questions. A valuation or condition survey tells you what a Kensington and Chelsea property is worth or what state it is in; a measured building survey tells you precisely what shape and size it is — the dimensions an architect or engineer needs to draw from. If you are extending, converting or applying to the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, it is the measured survey you need, not a valuation.
You can, and for a small square room it is fine — but Kensington and Chelsea's stucco-fronted georgian and victorian terraces are rarely square, and small errors compound across a whole building until the plans, elevations and sections no longer agree. A laser or scanned survey cross-checks every dimension so the set is internally consistent. The cost is modest against a redesign, or an application the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea queries because the drawings do not match the building.
A full measured survey includes all three. Floor plans alone cannot tell you floor-to-floor or ceiling heights, which is exactly what a loft conversion, a structural calculation or a headroom check in a Kensington and Chelsea property depends on. We record elevations of each external face and cut at least one section through the building, so the existing set is complete and every later stage has the dimension it needs. the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is the decision-maker.
Yes — an accurate measured survey is the ideal base for both. A Land Registry-compliant lease plan is drawn from the same existing measurements, and a party wall surveyor works from an accurate record of the Kensington and Chelsea property and its boundaries. Commissioning one survey that serves the design, a lease plan and any party wall work avoids paying to measure the building more than once. the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is the decision-maker.
We price each Kensington and Chelsea survey on the size of the property and whether you need plans only or plans, elevations and sections, and send a fixed, no-obligation quote within one working day. Larger or listed buildings that warrant a 3D scan are quoted accordingly. The survey pays for itself by keeping every later drawing and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea submission accurate. Call 020 7864 7245 to start.
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.