Straight answers

For a householder application — an extension or alteration to a single home — the statutory target is a decision within eight weeks of the application being validated. In practice we plan for eight to thirteen weeks. Validation itself takes time, the consultation period is fixed and cannot be shortened, and a busy authority will often ask for an extension of time rather than issue a refusal.

Applications that attract objections, go to committee, or need amended drawings part-way through sit at the longer end. If a decision goes against us and we appeal, add months rather than weeks — an appeal is a separate process on its own timetable. We build the realistic figure into your programme at feasibility, not the optimistic one.

Nothing gets built before it is priced. If you change your mind, or something on site forces a change, we price it in writing — with its effect on the programme stated — and you approve it before the work happens. That is the whole of our change control, and it is the reason the final number should never surprise anyone.

Genuine unknowns are handled differently. Where something cannot be known until a wall is opened or a floor is lifted, we name it as an allowance in the cost plan rather than pretending it is fixed. When the real position is exposed, the allowance is reconciled openly — up or down — against the actual cost.

It covers the design and the construction of your project under one appointment: concept and technical design, the drawings and specifications, the construction itself, programme and cost control, coordination of every trade, snagging and handover. One contract, one team, one number to call.

It does not cover money that goes to third parties: council planning and building control fees, surveys, party-wall surveyors, utility connections, and anything you choose to buy or contract directly — loose furniture being the usual example. It also does not remove your decisions. The contract concentrates responsibility for delivery; it does not make the choices about how your home should work.

We carry the interface between design and construction — the risk that a detail cannot be built, that two trades have been drawn into the same space, or that the drawing implies a cost the price did not. In a traditional appointment that risk sits in the gap between architect and builder, and the client ends up refereeing it. Under one contract it is ours, and it is the main thing you are buying.

You carry scope: if the brief grows, the cost grows, and no contract structure changes that. Genuine unknowns are shared through named allowances, priced openly when they are exposed. And no one — us, or anyone else — can carry the risk of a planning decision. We can build the strongest case, advise honestly on the odds and tell you when we think an application will fail; we cannot guarantee a consent, and you should be wary of anyone who does.

Towards the end of the build we walk the project with you and produce a written snag list — every item, however small, with a date against it. The list is worked through and re-inspected rather than declared finished. It is a normal part of every project, not a sign that something has gone wrong.

At handover you receive the completed building along with the documentation that belongs to it, and we stay close through the first year of use. That first year is when a building tells you the truth about how it was made, and we would rather be there for it.

Yes. We are happy to take a scheme we did not design — including one that already has planning permission — through technical design and construction.

We review the information first, and we will tell you before we start if a drawing set cannot be built for the money it implies. We would rather have that conversation at the beginning than discover it halfway through. Where the design is someone else's, we will also be explicit about which parts of the design risk we can take on and which parts remain with its author.

Three ways, chosen with you at feasibility rather than imposed: design fees staged by work stage, so you only commit to the next stage once the last has earned your confidence; a percentage of the agreed construction cost, the conventional architect's basis; or our preferred model, a fixed design fee with a measured, cost-controlled build under a single design-build contract.

Which one suits depends on the project and on how much certainty you want, and how it is structured is agreed before any work begins. Professional fees sit outside the build cost ranges we publish.

Yes. Feasibility on its own is a common starting point, and often the most useful thing we do — it tests what a site will take and what it should cost before anyone commits to a design.

You can also engage us for planning only, for technical design, or for the whole journey through to handover. We will say which route we think serves the project best, but the decision is yours and you are not committed to the next stage by taking the last one.

The studio is based in Maidenhead and works across the Thames Valley and West London — principally Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire and Oxfordshire.

Being close to a project matters more than people assume, because it decides how often the people who drew a detail can stand in front of it while it is being built.

We talk about the brief, the budget and the site, in that order, and we are direct about what the three imply together. If the budget and the ambition do not meet, it is far better to know at that point than after a year of design.

There is no obligation and no charge for it. If the project is not right for us, or we are not right for it, we will say so and point you somewhere more useful.