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READERS BEWARE. RANT. Architects and other Building related Pen Pushers.


Patrick

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Our architect designed us a great house and came up with innovative ideas that we would never have thought of ourselves - also helped navigate us through planning and played the game with the LA to get us through. Money well spent in my opinion.

 

I will say through that they did their best to talk us out of having a basement (expensive, cold and damp was their initial view) but we persevered and it's one of the best parts of the house. They just drew it as a big square box on the plan and we decided later how to split it into rooms (actually our electrician did out of sheer frustration and we gave his design to the joiner to build).

 

However when it came to the detailed design phase they were a bit of a let down - zero awareness of passive or even low energy design and very sceptical of timber frame construction.When they asked for £15k to discharge the 12 planning conditions and rework the very detailed drawings we'd get from MBC, we amicably parted company.

 

We took it from there (with lots of help from this forum's predecessor and more than a few of the regular contributors) - a turnkey TF design & build removed a lot of the risk and the rest was basic PMing and paperwork. A good independent BCO helped (came on their recommendation) and when we were done, they came for a visit and were genuinely impressed at the execution and performance we achieved.

 

I just think that our requirements were out of their comfort zone at that time and it would have been very frustrating for both of us to continue working together.

 

By luck and some site constraints (their admission), their design worked well in the location for passive performance and we had enough glazing in the right places to minimise excessive gain.

 

I just think that self building is still relatively rare in the UK so most of their bread and butter is extensions and commercial commissions. They also said that a surprisingly small amount of their bigger work (whole houses, developments etc) ever gets built as people get cold feet, refused planning / finance etc. They obviously get paid for their work regardless.

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12 minutes ago, Sensus said:

 

Funnily enough, that's the exact opposite of the situation I usually find myself in... almost everyone seems to have a fixation with large bifold doors and 'bringing the outside in', at the moment, and think you're some sort of idiot when you tell them that you have to be careful with both excessive heat loss and solar gain.

 

 

 

 

I think that Kevin McCloud may have something to do with people having that view!

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28 minutes ago, Sensus said:

If you use that logic, then if you choose to engage the services of an architect, you can't really complain, either.

 

If you think you know everything, and they add no value to your project, then don't use one - do the design and detailing your self. :)

You can complain as you are paying for a particular service. If you feel it's not up to a high enough standard like the OP then you have every right to complain.

If you choose to use an architect then that's up to you. I had to use one as I needed him to certify each stage was built to the regs to satisfy my mortgage company before they would release the next sum of money. I had it all designed out and detailed myself so it was really only his signature I needed. 

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46 minutes ago, Sensus said:

 

One of two things, usually:

 

Either because they think they know better, so they see no value in listening to what the Architect has to say.

 

Or else, they are mentally thinking 'I'm sure he's got this all under control, so I won't bother focusing on what he's telling me... I'll just smile and nod and I'm sure it will all be OK'.

 

I find it's the language they use sometimes. not all but we're working with a couple at them moment that love to use excessive amounts of obscure words. 

 

I had to Google "pilaster" the other day because the architect obviously didn't want to call them fake columns in front of the customer. 

 

 

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14 minutes ago, Construction Channel said:

 

I had to Google "pilaster" the other day because the architect obviously didn't want to call them fake columns in front of the customer. 

 

Now this is getting controversial. St Paul's Cathedral has umpteen pilasters. A sign of good taste.


Wash your mouth out in a whb (wash-handbasin), young man :ph34r:.

 

st-pauls-cathedral-pilaster.jpg.5fca67415274ed6fa4133238fb24f890.jpg

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42 minutes ago, Sensus said:

 

I find that a sharp slap when I think they're not paying attention usually works.

 

 

Damned right! The man's a menace - and he's not even an Architect.

 

Yep. Kevin McCloud is a decorator !

 

His first 5 books were:

 

Kevin McCloud's Decorating Book, was published in 1990. 

The Techniques of Decorating

Kevin McCloud's Lighting Book were published in 1995, 

The Complete Decorator in 1996, and 

Choosing Colours in 2003.

 

(Not to underestimate the chap, and I would not go quite so far as "menace".)

 

F

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1 hour ago, Sensus said:

 

Google: vestibule door frame.

I didn't know this was called a vestibule door frame. I just know this as a Door (variation of a normal entrance door). It s my English.

Basically it's this:

Eingangstuer-Haustuer-anthrazit-glas-mil

 

Problem is, this is not possible with a "normal" window that is around 1200mm wide and it STILL has a frame between the window and the door part, even though it's integrated in the "complete package".

Not to worry to find a solution, I corrected the plans and quit my dealings with the Architect( (s) for good).

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1 hour ago, Sensus said:

If you think you know everything, and they add no value to your project, then don't use one - do the design and detailing your self. :)

Excellent point. Should have done this and would have done this if I was not under the illusion (fed by architects) that they would do Plans/planning/drawings/stuff quicker and better than I would ever be able to and therefore save me stress, headache, time and potentially even some money. As I had to realise now, quite the opposite is the case and yes, I should have just done it all myself and this I probably the main point I'm making for the fellow self builders starting off which fit in the category "hands on ambitious fast learner"

✌️

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4 minutes ago, Patrick said:

Excellent point. Should have done this and would have done this if I was not under the illusion (fed by architects) that they would do Plans/planning/drawings/stuff quicker and better than I would ever be able to and therefore save me stress, headache, time and potentially even some money. As I had to realise now, quite the opposite is the case and yes, I should have just done it all myself and this I probably the main point I'm making for the fellow self builders starting off which fit in the category "hands on ambitious fast learner"

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It's perfectly possible to do everything yourself, it's what I ended up doing.  I will say that it's pretty damned time consuming though.  I had about a year's delay, caused by the plot boundary problem, and used all of that year reading up on design, building regs, researching methods of construction, doing drawings, making scale models, tearing the models up and making new ones.  The only transferable skill I had when I started was a background in design (albeit of light aircraft and boats) and around 25 years or so experience of driving AutoCad (a significant benefit, as I didn't need to learn how to produce drawings).  I've no idea how many hours I put into the house design in total, but it must have been several hundred, spread over the best part of a year.  I wasn't working, either, so I had pretty much all day, every day, to dedicate to research, learning and designing the house.  If I'd had to pay myself a reasonable rate I wouldn't have been able to afford my services...

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14 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

Out of all the house build/renovation TV shows, I think George Clark is the only presenter that's actually an architect.  IIRC,  Charlie Luxton is an Architectural Technician, and probably the only other presenter with any form of architectural qualification.

 

There are others, especially some who are Team Experts rather than the presenter. The two on "Your House Made Perfect" were brilliant.

 

We did this to death before

(Ooops. It came up with the picture of Julia Kendall climbing the side of a building in heels demonstrating her "30 years of power-tool techniques" ... beats Kevin and a model made of 28 Ryvita and Processed Cheese, anyhoo.)

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3 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

.  I've no idea how many hours I put into the house design in total.  If I'd had to pay myself a reasonable rate I wouldn't have been able to afford my services...

I think I would already be a wealthy man, even with minimum wage, with the hours I put into this project so far and we just starting ?

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4 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

We did this to death before

(Ooops. It came up with the picture of Julia Kendall climbing the side of a building in heels ... beats Kevin and a model made of 28 Ryvita and Processed Cheese, anyhoo.)

 

My current favourite is the wild haired NI guy who was on the BBC show where they used VR to show the designs to clients (which I think is a great idea, would have helped me immensely).

 

Liked a lot of his refurb design ideas (some were a bit out there though).

 

Unlike many TV architects, he also doesn't seem to have too much of an ego (cough) https://www.robertjamisonarchitects.com/. Or maybe just a strong sense of irony.

 

 

 

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26 minutes ago, Sensus said:

Personally, I'd describe them as a 'decorative element intended to give the appearance of a column, whilst not being structural, but in view of the above, I may need to be more careful with that...

 

Unless it is a buttress as well ?.

 

In which case I guess you say it is a decorative element around a structural element.

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38 minutes ago, Sensus said:

Personally, I'd describe them as a 'decorative element intended to give the appearance of a column, whilst not being structural, but in view of the above, I may need to be more careful with that...

 

10 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

 

Unless it is a buttress as well ?.

 

In which case I guess you say it is a decorative element around a structural element.

 

They're fake columns and that's the end of it. 

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I didn’t spend a lot of time designing ours, I found a design on a website somewhere that I thought worked well and with a few adjustments thought it was good for us, er indoors agreed and that was that. The footprint was within 10% of the building we were replacing (although another story higher). I spent more time learning about passive build techniques and incorporated that ethos into the build. As I said before, the architect just transferred it from pencil and paper onto CAD (wish I had found an architectural technician instead £££).

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3 hours ago, Patrick said:

 

 that you can not put a window next to a door in a timber frame house without a structural element (e. G. Stud) in between has really nothing to do with that.

We have one such window and door immediately adjacent.  All that is needed is a lintel to span the combined width of the window and the door.

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My only dealings with an architect was 16 years ago when doing our first house.  I contacted 5 architects, made appointments with 3. Two bothered to turn up to see us.  Then both of them gave quotes in the order of £25K.  ALL I wanted was someone to take our ideas and turn them into a buildable house and do all the drawings. Neither had a "pick and mix" attitude to services offered they both just wanted to take on a full package of turnkey project management when all I wanted was design and drawings.  And to make matters worse, they both based their fees on a percentage of build costs, but their estimated build costs were way over what we had, and if it really cost that much to build would have cost way over it's market value.  We ended up building for half their build cost estimate.  That is verging on sharp practice to me, over estimating the build cost in order to get a percentage based fee higher.

 

I did not repeat that soul destroying exercise this time. I found an architectural technician willing to do just the work we wanted.

 

Interestingly I have a cousin who is training to be an architect and I saw her a couple of weeks ago when we were down for a wedding.  I think I gleaned 3 things from her.  1: she is beginning to doubt if the length of training is really worth it.  2: she has no desire to do residential, she finds houses not challenging and boring.  3: She did not seem to know (i.e I assume not being taught) very much at all about low energy buildings and modern ideas like heat pumps mvhr etc.

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27 minutes ago, ProDave said:

We have one such window and door immediately adjacent.  All that is needed is a lintel to span the combined width of the window and the door.

Yep. This one I can understand, no problem.

I wasn't trying to express that there was never a way to do this, and in a common TF it would probably be easy enough. As mine is Portal Frame, it needs the Portal Frame Structural Element every 1000MM. Sure, there are ways around it and yes, it can be done differently. But in my case was just (expletive deleted)ed up by a useless architect(who designed the Portal Frame) , hence my rant.

I sorted it, blown off some steam with this post and fired the architects(not just because of this) and redone their bodged job myself.

Happy days

 

✌️?

 

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well solicitors are my 'pain' at the moment.  Just at the vinegar stroke of getting the mortgage to start the build (we have bought the plot, have planning & BC and groundworks done) and it got stopped this morning as we dont have vehicle access to the plot.  Charged me a load of money for an extensive highways search that is a screenshot of the cornwall online highways map... And the lack of vehicle access is because the last 20 metres of road is in fact a footpath.  Well it looks like a road, and 7 properties use it to access their houses, and we have to connect a drive and car port to the 'path' for planning. And the council re-surfaced it 2 years ago and has gas, electric and water under it.... Oh and we have it in the deeds that we can drive over any designated paths, roads, etc to access the site. Which of course means nothing if its a path, but its definitely a road. Oh and just past our access is access to the next property's drive which has been there well over 50 years and then after that there is a bollard so the path actually becomes a path.  madness

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