Most people don't, and that's fair — it's not exactly a transparent profession. A UK survey found that 15% of people didn't know architects design buildings, 22% didn't know we prepare construction drawings, 72% didn't know we apply for planning permission, and 91% didn't know we can manage project finances. So if you're not sure what you're actually paying for, here's the short version. An architect designs the building — the layout, the form, the materials, how it sits on the site, how the light moves through it. We prepare the drawings the council needs to grant planning permission. We prepare the detailed drawings a contractor needs to actually build it. We help you find and appoint that contractor, sit on your side of the table during construction, check the work as it goes up, sign off the payments, and stay involved until the building is finished and working. In short: from the first sketch on tracing paper to the last site visit before you move in, the architect is the person making sure the building gets made the way it was drawn.

More at the start, less at the end. The Listen and Collect stages are conversation-heavy — there's no shortcut to understanding how you want to live or work. Once the concept is settled, the studio takes the brief and runs with it, coming back to you at agreed milestones rather than for every decision.

Most clients don't, and that's the point of the early stages. The first few conversations aren't about answers — they're about working out the right questions. By the end of the brief stage, you'll usually know what you want better than when you walked in. If you arrived with strong ideas, that's fine too; the process just gets shorter.

Yes — and you should, while it's still on paper. Changes during design are normal and expected; that's what the drawing stages are for. Changes once construction has started are a different conversation: they cost more, take longer, and sometimes aren't possible at all. The studio will always tell you which side of that line you're on.

The budget gets set at the start, not at the end. Before drawing anything detailed, the studio works with a quantity surveyor or a trusted contractor to test whether what you're describing is buildable for the money you have. If it isn't, that conversation happens early — when there's still time to adjust the brief, not after the design is locked in.

Either, depending on how involved you want to be. Most clients ask the studio to handle it — contractor selection, site visits, payment certificates, problem-solving — through to handover. Some clients prefer to run it themselves with the studio as a designer-on-call. Both work. We'll agree which it is before construction starts, and you'll see the fee difference clearly.