ARTICLE 08
One of the Biggest Investments You’ll Make. Why Wouldn’t You Plan It?
Building a new home, renovating, or adding onto an existing house may be one of the largest investments you ever make.
But a home is different from most large purchases.
It may be the place where you spend the next several decades of your life. It is where you wake up every morning, raise a family, entertain friends, work, relax, celebrate milestones, and create memories.
With the cost of homeownership remaining high, the opportunity to build a new home or make a major investment in an existing one is also becoming increasingly significant.
So if you are going to invest that much money into a place you may live in for decades, why wouldn’t you take the time to really think through what you are building?
You Are Designing More Than a Building
A home does more than provide shelter.
The spaces around us influence the way we live.
The way a kitchen connects to a living room can affect how a family spends time together. The location of an entry can make everyday routines easier or more frustrating. Natural light can change the way a room feels throughout the day. Acoustics, privacy, circulation, views, storage, and access to the outdoors can all influence how a home is experienced.
Even relatively small design decisions can become part of your daily routine.
Over the course of twenty or thirty years, that matters.
A successful home should not only look good in photographs. It should support the way you actually want to live.
Planning Gives You the Opportunity to Figure That Out
Before walls come down, foundations are poured, materials are ordered, or crews arrive on site, there should be a clear understanding of what is being built and why.
You would not expect a surgeon to begin an operation without first reviewing scans, running tests, understanding the problem, and developing a plan.
Construction is obviously very different, but the principle is similar.
The more information you have before beginning something complicated and expensive, the better prepared you are to make good decisions.
Architectural design gives you the opportunity to study different possibilities before committing to one of them.
How should the rooms be arranged?
Where should the windows go?
How will you move through the house?
What spaces should feel open and connected?
Where do you need privacy?
How will the house respond to the site, views, sunlight, weather, and surrounding property?
What might your needs look like ten or twenty years from now?
Those questions are much easier to explore on paper than after construction has started.
The Earlier You Solve a Problem, the Less Expensive It Usually Is
During design, moving a wall may mean changing a few lines on a drawing.
During construction, moving that same wall could mean demolition, additional labor, new materials, electrical changes, plumbing changes, structural modifications, delays, and change orders.
The same applies to windows, stairs, kitchens, bathrooms, structure, mechanical systems, finishes, and countless other parts of a building.
A decision that may take an hour to work through during design can become a very expensive decision once materials have been ordered and people are already working on site.
Planning does not eliminate every construction problem.
It gives you a chance to solve as many of them as possible while solving them is still relatively easy.
A Clearer Project Is Easier to Price
Early in a project, it is common to think in broad terms.
“I want to renovate the kitchen.”
“We want to add a primary suite.”
“We want to build a 2,500-square-foot home.”
But each of those ideas contains hundreds of smaller decisions.
How large are the rooms?
What type of windows are being used?
What level of finishes are expected?
How complicated is the structure?
What site work will be required?
What mechanical systems are being considered?
What is included in the contractor’s price and what is not?
Until those questions begin to get answered, contractors have to make assumptions.
Different assumptions can produce very different prices.
Architectural drawings create a common set of information that everyone can work from. That allows contractors to better understand the scope and gives the owner a more meaningful way to compare pricing.
The clearer the project becomes, the more useful the numbers become.
Planning Does Not Mean Choosing Everything at Once
Good planning does not mean you need to select every cabinet pull, paint color, or piece of furniture before construction can begin.
Different decisions need to happen at different times.
Some decisions affect the structure.
Some affect permitting.
Some affect the layout.
Some affect cost.
Others can safely wait until much later.
Part of the design process is understanding which decisions need to be made now and which ones do not.
The goal is not to make the process more complicated.
The goal is to prevent important decisions from being made too late.
Think Beyond What You Need Today
One of the most valuable parts of designing a home is the opportunity to think beyond your immediate needs.
Maybe today you have young children and want spaces where everyone can be together.
Years from now, those children may be gone and the way you use the house may change.
Maybe you work from home now.
Maybe aging in place becomes important later.
Maybe a bedroom eventually becomes an office, a guest room, or a space for a parent.
A home cannot predict every change in life, but thoughtful planning can make it more adaptable.
That can be especially important when you are designing what you hope will become a long-term or forever home.
The Drawings Are Not Just Paperwork
It can be easy to think of architectural drawings as something required to get a permit or something a contractor needs before construction.
Their real value goes much further than that.
The drawings are where ideas are tested.
They are where different options can be compared.
They are where structure, materials, building systems, code requirements, and everyday use begin to come together.
They give you an opportunity to find problems before those problems are made out of concrete, lumber, steel, drywall, and labor.
The drawings are not the project.
They are the opportunity to solve the project before building it becomes expensive.
Protect the Investment, but Also Think About the Life Inside It
No amount of planning can eliminate every surprise from construction.
Existing buildings can hide unexpected conditions. Sites can present challenges. Prices can change. Decisions will still need to be made along the way.
But there is a major difference between dealing with a few unexpected conditions and trying to design the project while it is already being built.
When you are preparing to invest hundreds of thousands, or potentially millions, of dollars into a property, taking the time to understand what you are building is not an unnecessary delay.
It is part of protecting the investment.
More importantly, it is an opportunity to think carefully about the place where a significant part of your life may unfold.
You are not simply designing walls and a roof.
You are designing the setting for the way you want to live.
Michael Demetrios Frudakis, AIA, NCARB
Principal Architect