Advice and Tips for Your Garage Conversion
The best garage conversions are indistinguishable - it should be very hard for someone who isn't familiar with your home to be able to tell that your new room was once a garage.
Your new room will be an integrated into the rest of your home and should look like it has always been so. Here are a few points to consider in the planning and design stages-
Other than in exceptional cases the finished floor height should be level with the rest of your house.
Ceiling insulation will be upgraded and should be at a similar height to the rest of the ceilings in your home.
Thermal upgrading will need to be applied to the ceilings, floor and walls.
There may be a need to further upgrade the thermal property of an external wall.
Party walls (adjoining a neighbour's garage or property) may require sound absorbent quilting.
If a double garage is partially converted then the ceiling and wall in the retained garage will need to be double thickness to meet fire regulations.
Electric and gas meters should ideally be relocated to an external position.
Unsightly Fuseboards can be relocated and perhaps incorporated into storage.
As with the rest of your home, the new room should be heated either by connection to your existing central heating system, by underfloor heating or thermostically controlled heaters.
Windows should be of good thermal efficiency. It's also important that windows are a means of escape where necessary and are fitted with the appropriate hinge mechanism.
The style, colour and detail (i.e. leadwork) of the window should match as closely as possible the windows at your property.
Reduction in the size of the opening remaining when the garage door is removed is important to balance the external appearance of your home. Ideally the new window size should mirror the size of the existing windows.
If a brickmatch with your home's existing bricks is not available due to being discontinued, then the new brickwork will need to be tinted by a specialist brick cosmetic company.
Internal doors, coving, architraves and finishing detail should match the rest of your property as closely as possible.
You can add space and light to your home by installing French doors or perhaps a velux window in a vaulted ceiling.
Use a pitched roof space for storage by installing loft boarding, a hatch and a ladder for access.
Look at External Appearancesfor more information about the outside of your garage conversion.
Go to Build and Design for more specific information on the process and designing the inside of your new room.
