Drawings for a whole new home — an infill plot, a backland site or a house replaced with something better on your Woking land, taken from feasibility through a full planning application with its design and access statement to the building-regs set, coordinated as one package and revised free until approved, with a free plot check first.
Woking Borough Council granted 87% of the householder planning decisions it made in its latest published year — level with the 87% England-wide householder average. Metropolitan Green Belt covers roughly three-fifths of the borough, one of the highest shares in England, forcing growth onto the urban core, 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.
Before permission is required, Class B allows 40m³ of added loft volume on a terrace and 50m³ on a semi or detached house, and Class A allows a 3m single-storey rear extension on a terrace or 4m on a detached house. Woking carries at least one Article 4 direction, and conservation areas including Old Woking, Horsell and Hook Heath remove those rights outright, so we confirm your exact address before a line is drawn. A validated householder application in Woking is determined against an 8-week statutory target.
Woking town centre (dense modern flatted and commercial regeneration), Horsell (historic village character beside Horsell Common), Old Woking (the historic parish core with a conservation area), Hook Heath (affluent large detached houses on wooded plots), Knaphill (postwar and interwar suburban semis to the west) and West Byfleet (village-character commuter settlement to the north-east) — these are the Woking pockets our drawings cover most. Heritage designations here include Old Woking, Horsell, Hook Heath, Mount Hermon, St Johns and Byfleet. Woking Borough Council weighs each proposal against the Woking Core Strategy (adopted 2012) and Site Allocations DPD (adopted 2021), where consequent town-centre densification through tall flatted schemes sits in tension with protected village character at Horsell, Old Woking and Pyrford. Converted and purpose-built flats are common and growing, heavily concentrated in the town centre, and hold no householder permitted-development rights.. On roofs the borough is pitched gabled and hipped tiled roofs on the villas and semis and steep tile-hung and gabled roofs on the affluent detached houses, over Victorian and Edwardian villas around Woking, Horsell and Maybury built after the 1838 railway, large detached stockbroker-belt houses on wooded plots at Hook Heath and Pyrford, interwar and postwar semi-detached and terraced commuter suburbia and high-density modern flats in the town centre.
A new-build application is a different animal from an extension: you are not adapting a house, you are proposing a building where none stands. Across Woking the opportunities sit in the gaps — an infill plot between two houses, a backland site behind a garden, a large corner or driveway, or a tired bungalow worth replacing with a full house. The Victorian and Edwardian villas around Woking, Horsell and Maybury built after the 1838 railway, large detached stockbroker-belt houses on wooded plots at Hook Heath and Pyrford, interwar and postwar semi-detached and terraced commuter suburbia and high-density modern flats in the town centre that set the local grain also set the bar the new home is judged against, because Woking Borough Council weighs whether the design belongs on the street.
The drawings have to make the planning case and the buildable case at once. A scaled site plan fixes the footprint, the boundaries, the parking and the amenity space; the floor plans and elevations show a house that works and reads well; and the design and access statement argues the scheme against the local plan — its scale, its massing, its relationship to the neighbours' daylight and privacy. Metropolitan Green Belt covers roughly three-fifths of the borough, one of the highest shares in England, forcing growth onto the urban core, precisely the kind of policy a new-build design has to satisfy from the first sketch.
Where a plot sits in or beside a conservation area — Old Woking, Horsell, Hook Heath, Mount Hermon, St Johns and Byfleet among Woking's — the new house is judged on how it preserves or enhances the character of the place, and a contemporary or a contextual design each has to be justified. Woking uses Article 4(2) directions within its conservation areas to remove specified permitted-development rights, so minor alterations to houses in areas such as Old Woking and Mount Hermon need planning consent. We resolve the design approach against the setting before the application is drawn.
Yes — a new dwelling always needs a full planning application to Woking Borough Council. The design has to answer these questions before it is likely to be approved:
We take the plot from a free feasibility check through the full planning application — site plan, floor plans, elevations and design and access statement — to the building-regs and structural set, coordinating the whole thing so the house that gets permission is the same house that gets built and signed off by Woking Borough Council.
Below is Woking Borough Council's real householder decision record, drawn from official planning statistics and refreshed as new data lands. Woking is among the more restrictive commuter authorities, with dominant Green Belt and heathland designations the reason its countryside grant rate runs below the national average even as urban householder work fares better. A new dwelling is a full application judged on design quality — a scheme presented with a proper site plan and design and access statement is far more likely to land than a bare set of elevations.
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.
A new-build permission is won on the argument that the plot can take another house and that the design earns its place. Woking Borough Council's officers weigh the principle of development on the site, the scale and massing against the neighbours, the daylight and privacy impact, the parking and drainage, and the quality of the design itself. Across Woking town centre, Horsell and Old Woking these are the tests that separate a plot that gets developed from one that stays a garden — and the design and access statement is where the case is made.
Consequent town-centre densification through tall flatted schemes sits in tension with protected village character at Horsell, Old Woking and Pyrford. We often recommend testing the principle first — a pre-application enquiry to Woking Borough Council, or an outline application to fix the acceptability of a new home before the full design spend — then take the approved principle through to a detailed permission and the building-regs set, so a Woking plot is de-risked before the money goes in.
We design new dwellings on the infill, backland and replacement plots across the borough. A few of the Woking neighbourhoods where new-build sites come up most often:
New build drawings for a plot around Woking town centre's dense modern flatted and commercial regeneration — designed to sit in the street and drawn for Woking Borough Council's full planning process.
New build drawings for a plot around Horsell's historic village character beside Horsell Common — designed to sit in the street and drawn for Woking Borough Council's full planning process.
New build drawings for a plot around Old Woking's the historic parish core with a conservation area — designed to sit in the street and drawn for Woking Borough Council's full planning process.
New build drawings for a plot around Hook Heath's affluent large detached houses on wooded plots — designed to sit in the street and drawn for Woking Borough Council's full planning process.
New build drawings for a plot around Knaphill's postwar and interwar suburban semis to the west — designed to sit in the street and drawn for Woking Borough Council's full planning process.
New build drawings for a plot around West Byfleet's village-character commuter settlement to the north-east — designed to sit in the street and drawn for Woking Borough Council's full planning process.
A new dwelling is judged as a building in its own right. This is what the set has to include and what each part is judged on.
| Document | What it shows | Judged on | Stage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Site plan | Footprint, boundaries, parking and amenity space | Whether the plot can take the house | Planning |
| Plans & elevations | The house that will be built | Design quality and how it sits in the street | Planning |
| Design & access statement | The argument against the local plan | Scale, massing, daylight and character | Planning |
| Structural & regs set | Construction, drainage and structure | Buildability and compliance | Building control |
On a plot in a conservation area — such as Old Woking and Horsell, green belt or a flood zone — Woking Borough Council requires further justification before a new dwelling is acceptable.
A staged route that de-risks the plot before the full design spend — the principle first, then the detail, then the build.
Send us the Woking plot and what you want to build. We check Woking Borough Council's local plan, the site's designations and the likely acceptability of a new dwelling before you commit to design.
We develop a concept and, where it de-risks the plot, test it with a pre-application or outline enquiry to Woking Borough Council so the principle of a new home is confirmed before the detailed spend.
We produce the site plan, floor plans, elevations and design and access statement, with daylight/sunlight and drainage information where the site needs it, as a complete application.
We submit to Woking Borough Council, negotiate the design through determination, then produce the building-regulations and structural set and revise it free until the new home is approved and buildable.
Always. There is no permitted-development route to a brand-new dwelling, so a new house — whether on an infill plot, a backland site or as a replacement — needs a full planning application to Woking Borough Council. The application is judged on the principle of development on the plot and the quality of the design. We check the plot's realistic prospects against the Woking local plan before you spend on a full scheme.
It depends less on raw size than on whether the plot meets Woking Borough Council's standards for a new home — adequate amenity space, parking or access, privacy distances to neighbours, and a footprint that sits comfortably in the street. A garden or driveway that looks generous can still fail on overlooking or access. Our free feasibility check tests your Woking plot against these before you invest in design.
A design and access statement explains and justifies the design of the new dwelling — its scale, massing, materials and how it responds to the site and the local plan — and most new-build applications in Woking benefit from or require one. It is where the planning case is argued, so Woking Borough Council's officer can see the reasoning rather than infer it from drawings. We write it to answer the specific policies your plot engages.
Outline permission fixes the principle that a new home is acceptable on the plot without committing to the full design, which can de-risk a site before heavy spend; full permission settles both principle and detail in one go. For a single dwelling in Woking we often recommend a pre-application enquiry to Woking Borough Council first, then a full application, but on a marginal plot the outline route can protect you. We advise which fits your site.
Often yes. Replacing a tired bungalow or small house with a better dwelling is a common and viable route, but it is a full planning application judged on whether the replacement is a proportionate improvement in scale and design — Woking Borough Council will not simply wave through something much larger. On a plot near a conservation area such as Old Woking and Horsell the design is scrutinised more closely. We test the replacement's likely scale before designing.
We price each Woking new build individually, because the plot, the design ambition and whether the site needs daylight, drainage or ecology support all vary enormously, and send a fixed, no-obligation quote within one working day. It covers the coordinated planning and building-regs set with free revisions until Woking Borough Council approves. The structural engineer, any specialist reports and the council fee are separate. Call 020 7864 7245 to start.
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