What we fix in Purley: Webb Estate leaded lights and Riddlesdown bays
Three miles down the Purley Way from our Croydon workshop at 24 Waddon Close, we cover CR8 from the top of Woodcote down to the valley floor. JM Glass & Glazing are glaziers in Purley: leaded casements and oriels templated and matched on the Webb Estate, blown sealed units swapped into 1930s bays at Reedham and Russell Hill, and toughened door glass on the parades at Purley Cross.
Purley's best-known housing is the garden suburb William Webb laid out between 1903 and 1925: around 260 acres of it, and roughly 220 individually designed houses across the Webb Estate and Upper Woodcote Village. Arts and Crafts, Tudor Revival, a bit of Neo-Georgian. The glazing that goes with it is leaded casements, oriel windows and small-pane timber joinery, and almost none of it is a standard size. When one of those cracks you are not ordering a stock pane off a shelf. We take a template off the opening, match the came and the pane pattern, and put the light back the way it was.
Drop off the hill and it changes completely. Riddlesdown and the slopes above Reedham are almost all 1930s, a lot of it built by John Laing: curved bays, metal casements, some of it Art Deco in flavour. Most of those houses had sealed units retrofitted in the 1980s and 90s, and that generation of unit is now failing in bulk across CR8. Blown seals, water sitting between the panes, a permanent haze you cannot clean off from either side. That is the single most common call we get out of Purley.
Misted double glazing in Purley
A misted unit is a glass problem, not a window problem. The frame is usually perfectly sound. We measure the sealed unit, order it to size and swap it back into the existing frame, so a 1930s bay keeps its bay and you are not paying for a whole new window. Sealed unit replacement is most of what we do around Riddlesdown, Reedham and the Foxley Lane semis. If the frame itself has gone (rotten timber round the glass, a hinge that has dropped, a handle that will not lock), that is window repairs, and it is often the cheaper half of the job.
Sash windows and Victorian villas along the Brighton Road
The Brighton Road corridor and the roads off it (Downs Court Road, and the stretch running up towards Purley Oaks), are late-Victorian and Edwardian villas, and a good number of them are now flats. Sash boxes, big single panes, original glass in some of the upper lights. Broken glass in a sash means taking the sash out, getting the old putty off and bedding the pane properly, not tacking a bead over the top of it. We do glass replacement in sashes, and we will tell you straight when a window is better repaired than replaced.
- Misted and blown sealed units: swapped into the existing frame, right across the 1930s stock at Riddlesdown, Reedham and Russell Hill.
- Cracked and smashed panes: front doors, side lights, porch and greenhouse glass, toughened where the position calls for toughened.
- Leaded lights and small-pane casements. Matched to what is already in the opening on the Webb Estate and in Upper Woodcote Village.
- Sash and casement repairs: cords, beads, putty and glass in the Edwardian villas off the Brighton Road.
- Glass cut to size in Purley: shelves, tabletops, cabinet glass and mirror, measured on site and either fitted by us or left for you to fit.
- Splashbacks, mirrors and balustrades, the kitchen and staircase work that tends to come with the larger Woodcote houses.
Shop front glass on Purley High Street
Purley's high street has held up better than most in the borough. The parades either side of Purley Cross, Russell Hill Parade and the run down towards the Tesco end carry a lot of independents (cafes, restaurants, estate agents, takeaways), and that is where the commercial glass work comes from. Toughened door panes, shopfront glazing, manifestation on full-height glass, and boarding up after a break-in with the replacement measured on the same visit. Shop front glass replacement is a different job from a house window: it is toughened or laminated, it is heavy, and it usually has to be done before the shop opens.
The 1880s parade on Godstone Road at Kenley is a different animal again: period frontages sitting inside the Kenley Aerodrome conservation area, with the controls that come with that. Two schemes are also changing the centre of Purley: Mosaic Place on the Purley Baptist Church island site, up to 17 storeys with 114 homes and retail below, and the proposals around the old Purley Pool site. Both bring communal, balcony and shopfront glazing with them.
The Webb Estate, Upper Woodcote Village and Article 4
If your house is on the Webb Estate or in Upper Woodcote Village, replacing windows is a planning question before it is a glass question. Both are conservation areas carrying Article 4 directions, and Croydon has an updated appraisal and management plan covering them. In practice that means the permitted development rights you would normally lean on have been withdrawn, and like-for-like matters. Leaded lights, timber casements and oriels, matched to the original bar pattern. An off-the-shelf uPVC frame in a Woodcote elevation is the thing that gets refused.
We are not a self-certifying installer, so where a replacement needs Building Regulations sign-off it goes through Croydon Council's Building Control rather than a certificate from us. We would rather say that up front. What we can do is match the existing glass and the existing bar pattern. Shaped and curved work is normal for us, Edge Building Products made one of our roof light refurbishments their Installation of the Month for July 2025, 44 shaped double-glazed units set into 50mm capped aluminium glazing bars. The same measuring discipline goes into an oriel on Upper Woodcote Village.
How we get to Purley from Waddon
Our base is 24 Waddon Close, CR0 4JT, just off the Purley Way. The A23 runs from more or less our door, down through Fiveways, to Purley Cross: about three miles, and a straight run outside the rush. That is why we can get out to CR8 for one broken pane in a way a firm coming across from Wallington, or down from Essex, cannot. Access is the only real wrinkle here: the Webb Estate roads are private and narrow, and Foxley Lane and the Woodcote side need the van put somewhere sensible, so tell us about parking when you call.
For a window that has left a house or a shop open, call rather than email. We can usually board up and make the property safe, and we aim to do that the same day where we can. Emergency glazing in Purley, Riddlesdown and Kenley is the same three-mile run as everything else we do. If you want to see the standard of the work before you ring, there is a gallery of real jobs, and the reviews are from customers around here.
Glazing services we provide in Purley
What Purley phones us about, from a leaded light up on Woodcote to a blown unit in a Reedham bay.
Areas near Purley
We also cover Croydon, South Croydon, Coulsdon, Sanderstead, Kenley, Caterham. See every area on our areas covered page.
Frequently Asked Questions
All of it. CR8 1 through to CR8 4 (Purley Cross, Woodcote, the Webb Estate, Russell Hill, Reedham, Riddlesdown, Roke and Kenley), plus the Purley Oaks fringe that falls into CR2. It is one run down the A23 from us in Waddon, so a job on Foxley Lane is no harder for us than one on the high street.
Usually not without permission. The Webb Estate and Upper Woodcote Village are conservation areas with Article 4 directions, so the permitted development rights that would normally let you change windows have been withdrawn and you need to apply to Croydon Council. In practice they want like-for-like: leaded lights, timber casements, the original bar pattern. We can match that.
We are at 24 Waddon Close, CR0 4JT, about three miles from Purley Cross straight down the A23. Traffic through Fiveways and the gyratory decides the rest. We do not promise a time down the phone, but for a broken window we aim to get out and make the property safe the same day where we can.
Almost certainly not. Misting means the seal on the double-glazed unit has failed and moisture is sitting between the panes. The frame is usually still sound. We measure the unit, order it to size and fit it back into the same frame, so the bay keeps its shape and you are not paying for new windows you do not need.
Yes. Shelves, tabletops, cabinet panes, mirror, greenhouse glass: give us the sizes and the thickness, or we will come and measure. We will tell you where it needs to be toughened rather than float glass, which matters for anything low down, in a door, or near a bath or a shower. We can bring it out to CR8 or fit it while we are there.
Yes. Broken shopfront panes, toughened door glass, manifestation on full-height glazing and boarding up after a break-in, on the parades either side of Purley Cross, Russell Hill Parade and the Godstone Road parade at Kenley. If a unit has been left open we will board it and measure the replacement on the same visit.
Yes. Toughened is what goes into anything low down, in or beside a door, or near a bath, and into the shop doors on the parades either side of Purley Cross. It has to be made to size before it can be cut, so we template the opening first, whether that is a porch side light on Foxley Lane or a full-height pane on Russell Hill Parade. Float glass is fine elsewhere and cheaper, and we will tell you which the position needs.
The glass, in almost every case. Most Purley windows we see have a sound frame and a failed sealed unit or a broken pane, so we replace the glass and leave the frame alone, which is quicker and much cheaper than a new window. Sashes off the Brighton Road get new putty and glass rather than a new box. If the frame itself has gone we will say so, but we are glaziers, not a replacement-window company, and on the Webb Estate a new frame is a planning question first.