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I have worked on several large developments for decent sized architecture practices (50+ staff) for Taylor Wimpy / Barratts / Redrow / Lindens and more, you would not believe the shit we have to do.
The design standards are based around no of bedrooms and no of occupants only and that determines price. So you might have a 2 bed / 3 person unit, or a 3 bed 5 person unit. As long as you can fit all the associated furniture for each into the unit (in whatever configuration) it will pass minimum standard.
I felt like I was doing a jigsaw puzzle, not designing a house. The architect and the developer frankly couldn't give shit as long as you churned out the right number of units per week.
After this process of setting out maybe 400 houses the cost cutting would begin. Any detail would be stripped away from the design. There would no longer be any room for a chimney breast due to the space issues so they put prefabricated plastic chimneys on the roof to adhere to planning drawings. And the architect swallowed all this because the developer pays the bills. Unbelievable.
Ironically, I now run my own practice and earn a living converting badly designed houses for clients amongst other things.
There is a small developer who has acquired an option on a site in a very desirable village in the South Downs.
He's been working closely with his architect and planning consultant to produce two arts and crafts style detached houses with parking and gardens.
The site is currently tired industrial, but has been earmarked for residential with a new industrial centre out-of town also allocated.
The design has been produced - the local estate agents love it - and pre-application submitted to local authority.
The reply comes back that it ticks all the boxes and looks great, but that particular site is not yet ready to be classified residential.
The planning consultant looks as the detail and spots that under Permitted Development the developer can convert the existing building in to 9 separate flats without parking or gardens. No need to get planning approval.
So the option the LPA have given the developer is this:
1. Walk away and lose your option fee.
2. Build out 9 crappy flats and make half a million.
What he really wanted to do was:
3. Build 2 quality houses that will benefit the town and that he can be proud of and make a decent profit.
The other issue is building detached houses so close together that maintenance becomes impossible without having extensive scaffold. Some years ago I was asked to replace some rotting facia board on one of the Persimmon houses, less than ten years old, but crappy low grade wood toshed over with one coat of paint. The customer was happy with £200 for doing the work, but not so eager once I explained I could not a get a ladder in and would need scaff which would be another £350. Needless to say they've never had the work done.
Effects for Me & my Monkey YouTube channel Facebook Fretboard's "resident pedal supremo" - mgaw
Also, a house that has no convenient place to keep the bowls the cat eats and drinks from is no good to me. You'd be surprised at the number of places that don't.
Seriously: If you value it, take/fetch it yourself
i also dislike those dumb sinks that are like bowls placed on a table top.
i just want a nice sized, white sink on a pedestal.
Effects for Me & my Monkey YouTube channel Facebook Fretboard's "resident pedal supremo" - mgaw
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2017/dec/09/bovis-homebuyers-class-action-lawsuit-property-defects
Seriously: If you value it, take/fetch it yourself
Effects for Me & my Monkey YouTube channel Facebook Fretboard's "resident pedal supremo" - mgaw
Regarding enormous windows, the downsides:
Unless you're a single dwelling in the middle of nowhere you will have no privacy at all, it's like living in a goldfish bowl (I speak from experience) and the cost of replacement units is mega. Reglazing that second house would be eye watering. The top house looks like a 1950s concrete office block.
Effects for Me & my Monkey YouTube channel Facebook Fretboard's "resident pedal supremo" - mgaw
Nil Satis Nisi Optimum
I'd quite like a castle ...
Seriously: If you value it, take/fetch it yourself
Seriously: If you value it, take/fetch it yourself
Remember, it's easier to criticise than create!
Bathrooms have basins.
'never had a bideu (spelling), so no complication there.
Effects for Me & my Monkey YouTube channel Facebook Fretboard's "resident pedal supremo" - mgaw