Opening up a wall in your home

Many people want a wider doorway, or two small rooms turned into one bigger, brighter space.

Making an opening in a wall often means putting in a beam, usually steel, to carry what the wall used to hold up. These notes help you plan the job well. They follow Planning Portal guidance for England.

Permissions to check first

You should not need planning permission to remove an internal wall or make an opening in one. A listed building is different, because significant works need listed building consent.

Building regulations normally do apply when you remove an internal wall or form an opening in one. Approval comes from a building control body. You can use your council's building control team or a private registered building control approver.

Building regulations approval and planning permission are separate, and some projects need both.

Is the wall load-bearing?

A load-bearing wall holds up other parts of the house. It may carry ceiling joists from the loft, a wall directly above it, or floor joists that rest on it. Sometimes a beam left from an old chimney breast sits on it.

A structural engineer or surveyor can tell you whether a wall is load-bearing. They can then design a beam to carry the loads.

How the beam is supported

The beam is designed for the loads the wall used to take. Each end rests on a support, usually a wall, that can carry those loads down to the foundations.

Planning Portal says a new beam should normally rest at least 150mm onto the wall at each side of the opening. The wall under each end may need strengthening so it does not crush. This is often done with a block of dense concrete called a padstone. Its size depends on the job, so speak to a structural engineer or surveyor before work starts.

Fire protection for a steel beam

A steel beam should normally be protected so it resists fire for 30 minutes. The most common way is two or more layers of plasterboard, fixed as the maker specifies.

An exposed timber beam usually needs a calculation to show how much fire resistance it has. A concrete beam generally has enough, provided the steel inside is well covered.

Keeping a safe way out

Taking out a wall can change how people would leave the house in a fire. In a two-storey house this can usually be made up for with mains-powered, linked smoke alarms and escape windows from the rooms off the stairs.

In a house of three storeys or more, that may not be enough. The exact features needed vary from case to case.

Shared walls and the builder's duties

In England and Wales, you must tell your neighbours before building work on or near a wall you share with them. A party wall agreement is separate from building regulations approval.

When you have work done on your own home, the Health and Safety Executive explains that your client duties for site safety normally pass to your contractor.