A Chartered Town Planner (MRTPI) specialising in one thing: garden room, garden office, shed and outbuilding planning permission and planning applications across the UK.
Most planning consultancies treat garden room, garden office, shed and outbuilding planning applications as a side job — small fee, low prestige, slotted in between bigger projects. We don't. Garden Room Planning Permission was founded specifically to handle this corner of the market and to handle it properly: drawings and planning statement included, single fixed fee, written by a Chartered Town Planner.
The result is a service that's faster than instructing a separate architect plus planning consultant, cheaper than a generalist firm, and more rigorous than a download-and-tweak template service. One person, one fee, one accountable Chartered Town Planner from your first message to the day the decision arrives.
We act for homeowners across the UK — from compact home-office pods in conservation areas to generous family garden rooms in greenfield surroundings.
On paper, a garden room is one of the simplest things you can put on your land — small footprint, single storey, no foundations. In planning terms, it is one of the most rule-laden corners of the system. Class E of the General Permitted Development Order is studded with conditions: footprint, eaves height, ridge height, distance from boundaries, distance from the highway, location relative to the principal elevation, intended use, sleeping accommodation, ancillary use, garden coverage, materials, and a separate set of restrictions for conservation areas, AONBs, National Parks and the Broads.
Get any one of those conditions wrong and the build is no longer permitted development. That doesn't necessarily mean it's unlawful — but it does mean you need a planning application, a Certificate of Lawful Development, or both. And it means your case has to be argued, in writing, on planning grounds.
Most general-purpose planning consultants only see a handful of garden room cases a year. We see them every week. We know which councils are particular about eaves heights, which ones interpret "ancillary" strictly, which ones flag a kitchenette as evidence of independent residential use, and which ones quietly let it slide. We know which councils have removed permitted development rights through an Article 4 direction, and we know which Local Plans have specific outbuilding policies.
Plain English, always. We don't hide behind planning jargon. Every report we send our clients is written so a non-planner can read it, understand it, and feel in control of their own case.
Planning is stressful enough without an open-ended bill at the end of it. We work on a fixed fee, quoted in writing before any work begins, with drawings and the planning statement bundled into the same fee.
If we don't think you actually need a planning application — if your build is already permitted development — we'll tell you at the free check stage, before you've spent a penny. We would rather give an honest "you don't need us" than take on a case that wastes your money.
Includes drawings, planning statement, application form, submission and ongoing agent support to decision. Council application fees are paid separately at cost.
Garden Room Planning Permission is run by a Chartered Member of the Royal Town Planning Institute (MRTPI). Chartered status is not a marketing label — it is a regulated professional designation, awarded only to planners who have completed a recognised planning degree, demonstrated several years of professional experience, and passed a rigorous assessment of professional competence.
It also carries enforceable obligations. As a Chartered planner, we are bound by the RTPI Code of Professional Conduct — the same set of rules that governs the largest planning consultancies in the country. We owe duties of integrity, competence, independence and honesty to every client we work with.
For you, as a client, that matters in three concrete ways:
The garden room planning market is full of low-cost firms that run high volumes of cases through standard templates — same statement, same policy citations, same generic justification with the address swapped out. Councils spot it instantly.
We don't work that way. Every application we submit is written from scratch, by a Chartered Town Planner, after a personal review of the site, the planning history and the relevant policy framework. We use research tools to support our thinking — not to replace it.
Before you spend a penny, a Chartered Town Planner reviews your case and tells you the truth about whether you need an application. If your build is already permitted development, we'll say so — and we won't try to upsell you.
Your case is handled by the same Chartered Town Planner from start to finish. You'll always know who you're emailing, and your messages are answered the same working day.
We're regulated by the same professional rules as the largest planning consultancies in the country. Independent, evidence-led, and accountable.
Your case stays between you and your planner. We don't publish identifying details, and any case studies we write are anonymised so the property cannot be traced.
From instruction to a complete, ready-to-submit application package — drawings, statement and forms.
Our planning statements are professional documents the council needs to see — but everything we send you is written so a non-planner can read it, understand it, and feel in control of their own case.
Free check, no obligation, honest answers from a Chartered Town Planner.