Chartered planning drawings prepared for Southwark Council — from Victorian terraces in Peckham to warehouse flats in Bermondsey and the Dulwich Estate's extra consent layer, drawn to the borough's own guidance and revised free until you have a decision.
Southwark packs an extraordinary range of building stock into one borough. Bermondsey and Borough carry converted warehouses and mansion blocks close to the river; Camberwell and Peckham are dominated by Victorian and Edwardian terraces on tight plots; and Dulwich, East Dulwich and Herne Hill shade into leafy suburban streets where semi-detached and detached houses sit in generous gardens. Southwark Council reads each of those contexts differently, and a drawing pack that sails through in Peckham can attract objections in Dulwich Village.
We prepare architectural drawings in Southwark regularly, so we know what the council's validation team expects and where its case officers concentrate. Your pack is drawn to the borough's residential design guidance from the outset — existing and proposed floor plans, elevations on every affected side, a site location plan and block plan, all to recognised metric scales with paper sizes and scale bars stated.
One Southwark quirk catches many homeowners out: large parts of Dulwich fall within the Dulwich Estate's scheme of management, a private consent regime that runs alongside the council's planning system. If your property is on the Estate, you will usually need the Estate's approval as well as any planning permission — and the two applications are judged on different criteria. We flag this at the free approval check stage and prepare drawings that can serve both submissions, so you are never blindsided after the council has already said yes.
Many home projects in Southwark do not need planning permission — single-storey rear extensions, most rear-facing loft conversions and modest outbuildings can fall under permitted development if they stay within national limits. You will usually need a full application to Southwark Council if any of the following apply:
Whether it's a side return on a Peckham terrace, a mansard over a Camberwell parade or an internal reconfiguration of a Bermondsey warehouse flat, we draw to the way Southwark's case officers actually read a scheme — context first, objections answered on the page, and the Dulwich Estate's requirements folded in where they apply.
Southwark's validation checklist is exacting about scales, completeness and heritage justification. Every pack we prepare for the borough includes:
Every affected floor at 1:100 or 1:50, dimensioned and labelled, so the officer can see precisely what changes — essential on flats where the planning unit itself is in question.
All elevations altered by the work, with materials annotated. In Southwark's conservation areas, brick type, bond and joinery details are routinely scrutinised.
OS-based, site edged in red, any other land in your control edged in blue, with a north point on a recognised paper size.
Showing the proposal against boundaries, neighbouring outriggers and trees — the key drawing where rear-garden amenity and daylight are in play on terraced streets.
In conservation areas — and Southwark has many — a proportionate statement explaining how the scheme preserves or enhances character, drafted alongside the drawings.
Where the scheme of management applies, we prepare the drawing set so it can support the Estate's separate consent process as well as the council's.
Before committing to a project, it helps to know how Southwark Council actually decides. The figures below are drawn from official planning statistics for the borough. Refusals here cluster around a few themes: a side-return that overshadows the neighbouring outrigger on a Peckham terrace, a Dulwich Village alteration that jars with the conservation-area appraisal, or a Bermondsey roof addition that competes with a listed warehouse frontage — each of which can be anticipated on a well-prepared drawing. We design against those objections before submission, which is how our clients consistently land on the right side of the numbers.
Source: MHCLG planning application statistics (householder decisions, rolling year). Compare every borough on our London approval-rate league table.
Southwark decides applications under the Southwark Plan, adopted on 23 February 2022 and running to 2036, which replaced the borough's older Core Strategy and Saved Policies. The plan pushes major growth into the Old Kent Road opportunity area — the largest regeneration corridor in the borough, where the council is planning for around 20,000 new homes and an extension of the Bakerloo line — while asking for careful, context-led change across the established residential streets of Peckham, Camberwell, Nunhead and Rotherhithe. Around 48 conservation areas cover swathes of the borough, from Dulwich Village and Sydenham Hill to the Grand Surrey Canal frontages, and several carry Article 4 directions that strip out permitted development rights street by street.
The Dulwich quirk is worth understanding properly. The Dulwich Estate's scheme of management was created in January 1974 under Section 19 of the Leasehold Reform Act 1967, and it survives as a private consent regime covering a large slice of Dulwich Village, East Dulwich and Sydenham Hill. If your freehold sits within it, you must obtain the Estate's licence for external alterations or a change of use before you build — entirely separately from, and in addition to, any planning permission Southwark Council grants. The two bodies apply different tests, on different timetables, and one saying yes does not bind the other.
Elsewhere the borough's character shifts sharply: the warehouse conversions and mansion blocks of Bermondsey and Borough sit close to the river and to the Bermondsey Street Conservation Area; Peckham and Camberwell are dominated by tightly packed Victorian and Edwardian terraces where side-return and rear amenity dictate every decision; and Rotherhithe blends dock-era survivals with newer riverside flats. We draw each Southwark scheme to the context its case officer will actually weigh — and fold in the Dulwich Estate's requirements wherever the boundary catches your address.
Tell us your postcode and project. We score the odds against live Southwark decision data and flag conservation areas, Article 4 directions, listed status and the Dulwich Estate scheme of management where they apply.
We measure the property and produce accurate existing plans and elevations — the baseline Southwark's validation team checks first, and doubly important in older stock where nothing is square.
Chartered designers draw the scheme to Southwark's design guidance, answering daylight, outlook and heritage points on the page before an officer can raise them.
We submit via the Planning Portal, handle validation queries and liaise with your case officer through the eight-week determination period — and with the Dulwich Estate in parallel where needed.
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.
Southwark Council decides householder applications for Southwark, and its recent record and the permitted-development limits that apply here set out below give Camberwell homeowners a realistic starting point before any drawing begins.
| Measure | Figure for Southwark |
|---|---|
| Southwark Council householder approval rate | 89% |
| England-wide householder benchmark | 87% |
| Loft dormer permitted-development limit (Class B) | 40m³ terrace / 50m³ semi or detached |
| Single-storey rear extension depth (Class A) | 3m terrace / 4m detached |
| Dominant housing era | Georgian (1714–1837), Victorian (1837–1901) and postwar (1945–1970) |
| Statutory decision period | 8 weeks |
| Conservation / Article 4 status | Article 4 direction in force; PD removed in Camberwell Grove, Dulwich Village and Bermondsey Street |
Southwark runs 2 points above the national average. Approval rate: MHCLG householder planning statistics for Southwark Council; permitted-development limits: GPDO 2015, Schedule 2, Part 1 (Classes A–B).
Large parts of Dulwich fall within a scheme of management run by the Dulwich Estate, a private regime that requires the Estate's consent for many external alterations — separately from, and in addition to, any planning permission from Southwark Council. Getting planning permission does not remove the need for Estate approval, and vice versa. We check whether your address falls within the scheme at the outset and prepare drawings that can support both submissions.
Often not — a single-storey side-return infill on a Victorian terrace can fall under permitted development if it meets the national limits, though the side-return geometry needs careful checking. Inside a conservation area, or where an Article 4 direction applies, a full application to Southwark Council is usually required. We confirm which route applies before drawing anything.
Flats have no permitted development rights, so external alterations to a Bermondsey warehouse or mansion-block flat — new windows, terraces, rooflights — need planning permission, and many of these buildings sit in conservation areas or are listed. Internal reconfigurations may still need consent where the building is listed. Freeholder consent under your lease is a separate matter we recommend resolving early.
Southwark has a large number of conservation areas, covering much of Dulwich Village and its surroundings, parts of Camberwell, Peckham and the Borough and Bermondsey riverside among others. Inside them, extensions and roof alterations face closer design scrutiny and some permitted development rights are restricted. We check your address against the council's designations before we start.
Existing and proposed floor plans and elevations at 1:100 or 1:50, a site location plan at 1:1250 with the site edged red, and a block plan at 1:500. Roof schemes usually add a roof plan and section, and conservation-area proposals need a proportionate heritage statement. Our packs cover the full validation checklist.
Most refusals are resolved by targeted amendment — pulling a dormer back from the parapet, reducing a projection against the neighbouring outrigger, or adjusting a window that overlooks a garden. We revise the drawings free of charge and resubmit; a repeat householder application within twelve months of refusal usually attracts no further council fee.
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