From the plot to the permit, with real timings. What a concept design is and why it cannot be skipped, what an architect does that a site foreman does not, and what to ask before you sign.
Three bedrooms, a study, an open kitchen and "somewhere for the dogs" are not yet a commission. How a wish list becomes a brief with areas, relationships, priorities and a budget, what the architect will ask, and why adding up the rooms never gives you the size of the house.
11 min
Nine stages between buying a plot and holding the building permit. Which of them carry a legal deadline and which depend on you, what can run in parallel, and the three points where almost every project falls behind.
5 min
These are not questions born of mistrust: they are the ten whose answers change what you will pay, what you will get and who you can claim against if something goes wrong. With what each one ought to be answered with.
5 min
Most design commissions in Colombia are agreed over WhatsApp and a bank transfer. The six clauses where the arguments are actually lost, including one copyright rule, peculiar to architecture, that surprises both sides.
7 min
You have been handed a set of drawings and you do not know where to start. What the scale means, where the dimensions that matter are, what that thick line crossing the plan is, and the six things worth checking before you approve anything.
6 min
"Just send me some drawings so I can apply for the permit" is the request that skips the stage where everything is decided. What each design stage is, what is handed over at each one, and why changing your mind costs a hundred times more on site than on a drawing.
5 min
It is neither mistrust nor red tape: it is that nobody finds their own mistakes with the same enthusiasm they bring to finding somebody else’s. What an interventor does, when the law requires one, and when it is worth having on a house.
6 min
These are not three versions of the same service, nor three price brackets. They are three different trades, and the law reserves certain signatures to certain professionals. What each one does, what each may sign, and who answers if something goes wrong.
8 min
We start from how you want to live or work, not from a drawing. We set the brief, the budget and the timeline in order, and that turns into something you can look at and correct (massing, plans, images) before committing to anything.