Sliding doors in Heathfield, from the railway town to Old Heathfield
Heathfield is a market town of about seven and a half thousand people, south-east of Uckfield. It is further out than the other places on this site, but the same installer covers it.
How the town grew
The original settlement was Old Heathfield, which is now just one part of the town. What revived Heathfield was the railway, which arrived in 1880 on the line between Eridge and Polegate known as the Cuckoo Line. The line closed in 1968 and its trackbed is now the Cuckoo Trail, part of the National Cycle Network. The town that grew around the railway, and the housing added after it closed, make up most of Heathfield today. Heathfield Park, with its 17th-century mansion and the Gibraltar Tower memorial, lies in the parish.
Conservation area
Wealden lists a conservation area called Old Heathfield and Cade Street. That covers the old village and the hamlet of Cade Street, not the main shopping street and estates of the newer town. Houses in the town centre and on the later estates usually need no planning permission to replace doors and windows. Listed buildings, wherever they are, need consent.
What usually suits
Detached and semi-detached houses on the later estates often have a kitchen-diner where one wall faces the garden and another faces a side patio. A slider on one and French doors on the other is a common pairing: the slider for the view, the French doors for everyday comings and goings. Older railway-era houses nearer the town centre tend to have narrower back openings that suit French doors on their own.
If you already have a quote from elsewhere for bifolds, ask the surveyor to price a slider of the same size. It will be in the same bracket.
Illustrative example of a typical job
Three-pane slider and side French doors, detached house in Heathfield
The house: A detached house in Heathfield town with an L-shaped kitchen-diner: the long wall faces the garden and the short wall faces a side patio.
The spec: A three-pane aluminium slider on the garden wall and a pair of aluminium French doors on the side wall, matched in colour and glass.
Typically £12,400 to £21,750, supplied and fitted, including VAT.
Two openings in one room. The slider gives the view; the French doors are the everyday way out to the bins and the washing line.
