Walk the older streets of Steyning, Henfield or Storrington and look up. Many roofs are covered in small, slightly uneven clay tiles in warm reds and browns, some mottled with moss and lichen, many sagging gently between the rafters. Those are peg tiles, named for the way the traditional ones were hung. Each tile has a hole, or a pair of them, and a small timber peg holds it to the batten, the narrow strip of wood laid across the rafters.
A peg-tile roof is part of how these villages look, which is why repairs to one deserve more thought than a standard tile swap. The wrong tile can stand out for decades. The wrong repair can trap water, or load a frame that was never built to carry it. And in a conservation area or on a listed house, the wrong approach can need permission you did not know you needed.
This guide draws on the councils' own conservation area appraisals and on national guidance. It explains how peg tiles differ from modern plain tiles, how matching works in practice, where consent comes in, and how long an old peg roof can sensibly be expected to last. Whatever the general rules say, the survey of the actual roof has the last word.
Peg tiles in Steyning, Henfield and Storrington
The councils' appraisals of the three villages paint a consistent picture. Horsham District Council's appraisal of Steyning finds either Horsham slabs or clay peg tiles on its older buildings, and many of those roofs are hipped. A hipped roof slopes back on every side, with no vertical gable wall at the end. The Henfield appraisal says that many older roofs there are hipped or half-hipped, and that peg tiles are the usual covering, with stone slates less common and thatch rarer still.
Storrington's appraisal lists a wider mix of Sussex brick, flint, some Horsham slab roofs and numerous local clay tiles. That variety matters when you choose a repair. Two cottages on one lane can carry quite different tiles, and the neighbour's roof is not a safe guide to yours.
What sets a peg tile apart
A peg tile is a small clay plain tile, traditionally handmade, with a slight curve and a surface with some ripple in it. The tiles are small, so a roof needs a great many, laid in staggered rows, and each row sheds water over the lap, the stretch it overlaps the row below. Variation in colour, thickness and texture is part of the charm. Set a machine-made tile of similar size beside it and the newcomer looks sharp and flat.
For the practical differences between plain and interlocking tiles, see our guide on interlocking versus plain tiles. Our pages on Steyning, Henfield and Storrington set out more of the local building stock, and pitched roofing gives the wider picture.
Matching old tiles without a patchwork
The question we hear most on a peg roof is how to swap a few broken tiles without leaving a patch. A perfect match with brand-new tiles is rarely possible, so the aim is a repair that sits quietly in the roof and weathers along with it. That also means resisting the urge to tidy: a roof whose tiles have aged together looks settled, and one with a bright new patch looks injured.
There are three sources. The best is the roof's own spares, which sometimes survive in an outbuilding or a loft corner. Next come reclaimed tiles of the right size, gathered from other buildings, which arrive already weathered. Last are new handmade tiles, made to echo the old ones in size and texture, which can be scattered through a slope so that no single colour stands out.
How a repair is done
We lift the rows above, slide out the broken tile and bring in the replacement, then check the nibs, the small lugs on the back of each tile that hook over the batten, along with the pegs or nails holding the row. A tile that has lost its grip is the usual cause of a slip. On a roof this age the battens are often the real fault, so we look at those at the same time. Our guide to matching old roof tiles goes through the approach.
When replacements come from reclamation, we keep the original tiles on the front slope, where the eye lands, and use the mixed stock on the less visible faces. A scatter of weathered tiles reads as an honest repair. A single bright patch reads as a mistake.
When a peg-tile repair needs the council
Whether you need permission turns on three things: whether the building is listed, whether it stands in a conservation area, and what the work involves. They are separate questions with different answers.
Replacing a covering like for like is generally not something that needs a planning application, since the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 leaves out works that do not materially change how a building looks from outside. That is the starting position, and two things alter it. One is a listing. The other is an Article 4 direction, a council order withdrawing particular permitted development rights across a defined area. Steyning, Henfield and Storrington each have a conservation area appraisal, and the Horsham District planning team can say whether any direction affects roof work at your address.
Listed building consent
For a listed building the test is stricter. Under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990, a house that is listed cannot have work done that would change what makes it special without listed building consent. Adur and Worthing's own guide lists repairs done in different materials among the works that need it. The South Downs National Park Authority describes the other side of the line: routine upkeep, or a few tiles swapped like for like, are fine without consent, while altering features or replacing original material wholesale is not.
In practice, swapping a few broken tiles for matching ones is generally maintenance. Stripping the roof and recovering it in another tile is not. If you cannot tell which side your job falls on, ask the local planning authority before work starts. We explain the consent position at the survey, and will tell you plainly when we think a call to the council should come first.
Is an old peg roof at the end of its life?
You will often see a figure of 60 years for clay tiles. Marley says the Building Research Establishment set 60 years as the minimum life to expect from clay roof tiles, and MyBuilder says clay tiles need replacing after 40 to 60 years. Those numbers suit a modern tile in a modern roof.
They do not suit a roof of old peg tiles. The Building Conservation Directory is direct about it: a 60-year yardstick misleads when it is applied to historic peg-tile roofing. Handmade tiles fired generations back can be sound after a century or more, while a poorly fired batch can fail far sooner. What decides the life of an old peg roof is the quality of the individual tiles, the battens and the frame under them, together with the care the roof has had, and the date on the calendar tells you little.
What we look for
Our survey asks a different set of questions. Do the tiles ring clean when tapped, or sound dull and flake on the surface? Is the clay splitting into thin layers? Are the nibs intact? Are the battens firm, or soft with age? Is there an underlay, and is it torn? Where the answers are mostly good, the roof is a candidate for selective repair: a few tiles, a re-laid ridge, new battens in the worst places. Where they are mostly poor, the better route is a careful strip and re-lay, reusing every sound tile and making up the shortfall with matching ones.
That costs far less over the years than recovering a whole roof with plenty of life left, and it keeps the original material that the village streets are known for. If the survey shows a roof has truly reached the end, the photographs show it, and you decide with the evidence in your hand.
Ridges, hips and fixing on a heritage roof
Ridges and hips are the first parts of an old roof to suffer, because they take the wind. The ridge is the crest, and the hips are the sloping lines running down from it where two slopes meet at an outward corner. On a peg-tile roof they are often finished with clay ridge tiles bedded in lime or sand and cement mortar, sometimes with special hip tiles, or a bonnet-shaped tile over the angle.
Since the 2014 revision of BS 5534, ridge and hip tiles have not relied on mortar alone to stay put; they are mechanically fixed too. That gives a repair that stands up to gales off the Channel. Marley adds, however, that the 2018 amendment clarifies how the standard applies to heritage roofs, where its recommendations may not suit every case, and it advises talking to the local planning authority and conservation specialists.
Fixing with respect for the building
We take that to mean the fixings should be proportionate. On a modest cottage in a village street we can usually add concealed clips without changing the look of the ridge. On a listed property the conservation officer may have views on the mortar mix, the profile of the ridge tile and how much hardware shows, and we work to whatever is agreed.
Dry-fix ridge systems, tested to BS 8612, suit modern roofs well but are often a poor visual match on an old peg roof, where the lines and colours matter. They are not ruled out, and the choice is made case by case. The same care applies at the verges, the roof edges at a gable, where the traditional detail is tile-and-a-half, a wider tile that overhangs the wall a little.
We treat the whole ridge line as a unit, not one tile at a time. For more on how wind shapes fixing, see tile fixing on a windy coast.
Underlay, ventilation and dormers on a peg-tile roof
Many old peg roofs were laid with no underlay at all. Daylight shows through the gaps in the loft, and in a storm, fine snow and spray can blow in. Over the decades a lot of these roofs have been given felt under the battens, sometimes in a way that traps moisture in an old frame. When a repair or re-lay is planned, we weigh up whether to add a modern breathable membrane, which keeps wind-driven water out while letting vapour escape. The principles are in roof underlay and ventilation.
Care is needed because a tight roof can change how a historic frame behaves. A timber roof that has dried slowly over centuries may suffer if it is suddenly sealed, so we choose the membrane and the eaves detail to keep air moving.
Dormers and awkward junctions
Many older peg-tile houses have dormers, tile-hung cheeks and small valleys where lead or tile meets a wall. These are the places where leaks begin, and they are tight to work in. Lead flashings, the strips that seal a roof to masonry, need dressing with care so that historic brickwork is not damaged. Our guide to dormer roofs explains the roof form and the planning rules around adding one.
Where a roof has already been patched with felt, sealant or concrete tiles, expect the survey to find a mixture of fixes from different decades. The better route is usually to take out the poor patches and cure the cause, rather than adding a fresh layer on top.
Perished felt under the battens is a separate fault with its own cure, covered in our torn roof felt guide.
