Custom architectural design involves the process of engaging the services of an architectural professional to design home specific to your site and requirements. Pre-design refers to a ready made ‘stock plan’ that one can purchase.
Pre-designed home plans have up until recent times, with the exception of ‘SA Home Plans’ and a couple of similar sounding books (typically with plans arranged in chapters named Tuscan, Bali Style, Cape Cod, etc), been the sole preserve of residential developments. These typically have a selection of plans to choose from when buying ‘plot & plan’. In the timber home industry a couple of the larger firms in South Africa have, for many years, also offered clients a choice of pre-designed plans to choose from. The massive growth of the internet has, however, resulted in an almost endless choice of inexpensive (relative to custom design anyway) pre-designed plans one can simply buy online. One can assume, by the sheer volume of websites offering this, that many people are choosing this route.
While the typical architectural professional’s response may be that people are being short-changed by buying off-the-shelf plans, and that any design which doesn’t take it’s cues from the contextual issues of a particular site and requirements of a client is not and simply cannot be good architecture, many have joined in and are adding to the ever growing stock of available plans.
For builders:
An advantage is time. From being approached by a prospective new homeowner to the time when you actually get going and start earning money, the turnaround time on a pre-design plan would be significantly quicker than having to wait an extra sixth months or so for a design specific to the site and client’s requirements. You could simply refer an interested client to a pre-design website, once they’ve chosen a plan get it priced, use a registered draughtsperson to position the house on and add a site plan, submit the plans for approval and get started on site.
The flipside to this, if you are building from pre-design plans, is how do you differentiate yourself from every other builder? And given there will eventually be several builders building the same design, assuming pre-design grows in popularity here as it is doing overseas, how do you market yourself for the next job other than with good quality workmanship? All you are left with is price and if everyone is building a similar product the builder with the best price gets the job. Prospective clients, however, regardless of who designed the house, often decide on which builder to talk to based on what their homes look like. It then stands to reason that, assuming you want less tendered and more negotiated contracts, you work closely and build a relationship with a good designer, which in turn sets the look of your work apart.
For those of us in the design profession:
In what we as designers do for a living, my best work is often my next work – and that’s not to say I don’t enjoy the challenges and satisfaction in seeing and attending to a work in progress until its final completion. But the new project always provides a new opportunity to do some good, challenging, exciting architectural work. Contextual issues to consider include views, microclimate, access, topography, orientation, security and privacy requirements. Clients requirements informing the design include lifestyle, personalities, spaces to relax, cook, dine, entertain, work & play, future expansion needs and retirement. Add to this the ever increasing need for energy efficiency and sustainability, as well as the designers own aesthetic input. One considers all of these and solves, as one would a complex puzzle, for the best solution to achieve a result clients would consider ‘home’ as apposed to a house. An extension of themselves and their personalities – it’s not by chance you sometimes walk into someone’s well designed home and say “this is so you!” – as well as meeting all their practical requirements in their day to day living. And this does take time, a lot of time. The longest part of the design process is often the first part – figuring out, with the clients, exactly what their needs and requirements are.
For the prospective new homeowner:
Pre-design plans are significantly cheaper as you are not paying for the countless hours spent drawing up and re-working a custom plan. You are paying a reduced fee for the re-use of a standard plan that many other people will also be using. These are not designed with specific requirements in mind, but rather are broad interpretations of what people want. Plans are often categorised on a basis of common stylistic themes such as the previously mentioned Tuscan, etc, and I would recommend that aspirant pre-designers evolve this into more regionally relevant categories, taking at least broader local climatic regions into account, for example Karoo homes, Cape Coastal, etc.
The advantages of a custom plan done by a professional however, if you have the budget for it, are many. Besides the design being unique to your specific requirements and site, there are also advantages to having an architectural professional involved throughout the project. These include assistance with contract administration, selecting and appointing a contractor, monitoring progress on site and valuations for monthly payments. And it follows that the best person for the job would be one that was involved with the design from its inception.
Future scenario:
With conventional brick homes, pre-design has always had a place with larger ‘plot & plan’ residential developments. As timber frame becomes more of an accepted norm for residential housing developments so will, presumably, the demand for pre-designed plans for timber frame homes in that market.
For the client on the upper end of the spectrum, my guess is that it is unlikely that they would ever choose to go any other route than a unique custom designed home done for their specific site and requirements.
It is at the middle of the market (a typical three bedroom, one en-suite bathroom and one shared bathroom open plan living etc.) where we may see the emergence of this new trend. A potential new homeowner, who may have scribbled their own plan on a piece of paper, with the intention of giving this to a draughtsperson to draw up as is, may well be better off with a well designed stock plan – if at least basic adaptations are made to ensure correct orientation for the site.
A win-win situation in the lower to mid-budget market may well be a client who first browses a lot of online plans and then chooses something, as close to what they want, for adaptation – it’s often easier to decide whether you like something or not when looking at it than trying to articulate what you would like from scratch. This would cut a significant amount of time, and therefore cost, from the custom design process. Just Google ‘home plans’ and take it from there. Prices range from around R2000 to R4000 (there are also some offering plans for as little as R10 but, as with most things, you get what you pay for).
On finding a plan that closest matches your particular requirements purchase a well designed home plan and have that adapted to suit your requirements and site. This service is often offered by the designer selling the stock plans, which could be suitable if in your area, or could be done by any architectural professional you choose to work with. The end result may well be a house suited to your needs, with a significantly reduced design time and cost (even with adaptations), and a happy contractor who can get on with the building work sooner.
For many people though, your home, large or small, will remain as much an expression of who you are, and an extension of your personal space and attitudes, than just a mere house. Unless you are very fortunate to find a pre-design home that suits or is adaptable to your every need, myself and many others will be in the business of custom residential design for a long time to come. Your home, besides being your largest and most expensive asset, is also where you will spend most of your time, and it makes sense to put a relatively appropriate amount of thought, time and money well spent, into its design.
Pingback: 2010 in review | Jacques Cronje