In most cases, people who want to have bespoke conservatories tend to ask for them to be fitted to the back of their house.
Given that most people tend to like to use their conservatory as a gateway to their garden, this approach can make a lot of sense, especially since in most cases, people have far more space for expanding the back of their homes than either of the sides.
However, this is not always the case, particularly for oddly-shaped estates, and sometimes people will ask if they can fit a conservatory on the side of their home, either to benefit from more space or benefit from greater levels of sunlight on one side of the home compared to the back.
There are two answers to this. The short answer is that you absolutely can if you are willing to apply for planning permission, but the longer answer is that you can under permitted development rights fit a side conservatory, but there are stricter conditions than for a conservatory in the back garden.
Under the general rules for extensions under permitted rights, a conservatory can be fitted, but it can only be up to four metres high, by definition a single floor and can only be half the width of the original house or smaller.
The first two of these rules are not usually applicable to a conservatory, which tends to be lower than 13ft high and is by definition a single floor.
The other rule involving the width of the home can be more difficult to navigate depending on the shape of the house itself, as it can lead to surprisingly narrow spaces.
There are other rules as well, such as how your conservatory cannot be closer to the road than your house, it cannot be taller than your house and the pitch of its roof must match the existing house. It also cannot take up more than 50 per cent of the area around the house as first built.