Design Consultation: What do I get ?

1. A dedicated meeting with a Chartered Architectural Technologist, totally focussed on you and your project.
2. A wealth of industry experience, over 25 years. We’ve seen a lot of things and made a few mistakes. We’ve learnt from this and want to share this knowledge with you, so you don’t make the same mistakes.
3. An opportunity to talk about your ideas, no matter how crazy you may think they are. We will listen to your story and seek to understand your unique circumstances and requirements. Each project and the people involved are different.
4. Provide creative design ideas, explore different options and alternative approaches for a range of solutions. These are sometimes sketched out and a very basic set of drawings are created. These visual ideas help you understand how a project may come together and could be used to inform later design work.
5. Talk to you about how much a project may cost in very rough figures vs. your budget + highlight other expenses and fees you need to consider, such as other taxes and professional consultants. We are able to share pragmatic advice about how you can manage and control your costs.
6. Help you understand how to embed sustainability, energy efficiency and comfort in your project from the word go, not bolted on at the end.
7. Identify the key risks that may impact your project and work out how to proactively reduce these risks.
8. Provide realistic timescales for the architectural design work, legislative approvals and building work to be completed vs your expectations.
9. Flag up key bits of legislation that may apply to your project and land, and how these may impact your ideas. Not just Planning Permission, there are lots of other relevant pieces of legislation to consider.
10. Guidance on how best to do things to suit you and your priorities, such as the best way to hopefully obtain Planning Permission.
11. Assess practical build-ability issues and give honest and helpful feedback.
12. Work out what other professional consultants you may need to employ to ensure your project is a success.
13. Provide pointers on how to organise and manage the build process.
14. Establish how feasible your project is and work out practical ways to deliver your project as you wish.
15. A meeting to suit you and your commitments. We understand that due to busy lives it is not always possible to meet or talk during the daytime. Therefore, we are available most evenings and weekends to fit in with your schedule, to make it as easy for you as possible.
16. Help establish ways to reduce the hassle factor for you.

Why do I have to pay ?

• In the past we used to give free of charge Initial Design Consultations and shared really useful ideas and know how about how to make a project successful, provided practical design advice and gave away design features. We then discovered we weren’t employed for the project, someone else was. Our ideas then appeared to have been used by the other architectural practice. Clearly our ideas have value and can be put to good use.
• It helps us to ascertain if you are serious about doing things properly [because we are!] or if you just want some free ideas and the cheapest quote.
• It shows that you value our time, services and that you understand the benefits of working with us.