Know what the site will take, before you commit.

Consultancy is the stage before anyone draws a foundation. It exists so that the money you are about to spend goes into a building that can actually be built, approved and afforded.

• Site assessment. What the plot will physically take, and what its access, orientation and ground conditions mean for the design.
• Structural advice. Whether the structure you have in mind is sound for the span, the storeys and the loads you want.
• Buildability check. Whether the plan can be built at the cost and on the timeline you are assuming.
• Review of drawings you already have. Someone else designed it. We tell you what we would change and why.

Before you buy a plot. Land is the one decision you cannot undo. What you can build on it, and what it will cost to build there, should be known before the purchase, not after.

When you have fallen in love with a design. Plans drawn without a specific plot in mind are common and they often do not survive contact with the site or the setback rules. Better to hear that at the drawing stage than at the foundation.

When the numbers stopped making sense. If a quote or a plan has started to feel wrong, an independent engineering opinion is cheap next to the thing you are about to commit to.

A straight answer about what the job actually involves, including the parts that are cheaper done differently, or not worth doing at all. We would rather tell you that at the start than discover it together at the foundation.

Consultancy does not commit you to building with us. Plenty of people take the advice and the drawings and build elsewhere, which is a perfectly normal outcome.