Speak to with one of our expert RIBA chartered architects in Manchester and get everything you need to know for your next building project in Manchester.
I'll run through the typical services you should expect from a residential architect in detail throughout this article.
I'll also show you some of the extra routines we use in our service to improve the cost, quality and timeframe for your house extension, remodel or even new house projects in Manchester.
The main things you should look for when choosing residential architects in Manchester are:
Architects that focus on your goals, budget and timeframe - It's important that you feel in control of the process, typically your architect should be acting on your behalf as you 'agent' but you should always have the final say when it comes to decisions. This is typically how we operate throughout the process with residential clients. It's a balance that takes time and professionalism to master, but you should expect this from your architect.
Architects that communicate clearly and consider your feedback - design in many ways is about communicating as effectively as possible, and it's a big focus of our service that we've seen fall short at other architect companies. If you feel like your not being heard by your professional, it's likely they're not a good fit for you.
Architects that keep you fully in the know about everything - We hold ourselves to a minimum standard of keeping you informed about the ENTIRE process and what you can expect moving forward. That way you can proceed with confidence. In fact we typically offer a full roadmap over a free consultation, where you can find out if an architect is even what you need for your project or not.
This might seem like quite obvious advice when written out like this, but we've had many clients come to us after having bad experiences elsewhere with architects and they typically fully into one of these categories.
One of our house extension projects located in the greenbelt. Designed with close communication with the client.
We offer a full architects service for new house designs in Manchester as well and have seen how other architect companies operate when designing new builds and dwellings.
In my experience - the exact process for these types of projects will depend on the type of land you are looking to build on. This will affect the planning process more considerably. The planning permission process for an annexe building in Manchester will be a lot different than gaining outline planning permission for a new house to the rear of a street.
I'll get into the details of planning permission strategy in Manchester that further down in this article.
The key items when building a new house in Manchester and finding an architect for a house design in Manchester is whether the architects skills, specialisms and expertise are suitable for the goals of your project.
For instance, these are all items that other architects don't and often provide which we've found are particularly useful to house builders in Manchester:
1. PassivHaus Design and energy efficient construction: This is an area I have additional training in (roughly 300+ hours). It covers the highest standard of energy efficient design which can help reduce energy bills, increase the lifespan of your building and even allow you to go off grid with an eco home in Manchester.
It is regularly used as a method for gaining planning permission on NPPF 79 houses in Manchester as well.
2. Feasibility Studies on how to move forward: The feasibility study will likely be the most important part of the process with a house design project in Manchester. They determine whether a new house design is viable or not alongside any planning permission and construction risks.
We typically put together our feasibility studies alongside a full 3D site scan and initial design options, ensuring you have everything you need to decide the plan of attack.
3. Construction Expertise: Having a strong knowledge of construction trends in Manchester as well as strong fundamentals is something I was quite surprised to see lacking at other architect companies in Manchester. Construction design and building regulations approval for a new house in Manchester requires a good balance of aesthetics, ease to build, thermal and weather efficiency and also maintenance to ensure the new house will stand the test of time and won't need constant repairs.
We've seen time and time again when these steps get neglected or rushed for new build house projects in Manchester and they do create far bigger problems with time, cost and quality on site and after completion of a new build house in Manchester.
Our designs aim to satisfy even the most challenging requirements, whether that's net zero or historical aesthetics.
When it comes to building almost anything in Manchester, planning permission is a key hurdle for ensuring your project can be built. It can be easy for other domestic architects in Manchester to overlook this, but it's one of the most important areas to have attention to detail as it will affect everything you do after.
Planning permission in Manchester will typically fall into one of several categories, but it's not always a clear which application is the correct one for your project in Manchester. When working with an architect and considering your options, it's vital you get the type of application correct when your submit your project to Manchester City Council or your local council in Greater Manchester.
In my experience - its important to be as clear as possible about what the proposal is and to lean into favourable design trends in Manchester to help your project gain planning permission with Manchester City Council. This is something that needs to be balanced alongside other requirements of a building design, such as energy efficiency, cost and aesthetics being the most obvious ones. However it's important to note that other reports of statements may be required depending on your site, typically you'll want to catch these during pre-application advice or in the feasibility study.
Typically these will be required in areas close to an ancient woodland or priority habitat area. Note that for full planning applications you'll typically be expected to submit a Biodiversity net gain calculation or demonstrate you qualify for a de minimis exemption.
If you project is within a conservation area in Manchester or involves work to a Grade-I, Grade-II* or Grade-II listed building. You'll likely require a heritage statement. For conservation areas these can be quite simple, showing how the new design will keep the characteristics of the conservation area, for listed buildings a Heritage consultant might be needed to draft the statement.
For sites that are in flood zones you will need to submit a flood risk statement, this might be needed alongside some flood safety measures within the design to prevent the building from flooding.
Regardless of the project you are doing, whether it's a housing development in Manchester, a house extension in Manchester or a listed building renovation in Manchester. You'll always want to touch base with Manchester City Council during the application decision period in order to ensure the application is being reviewed favourably and there are no issues that might lead Manchester City Council to refusing the planning permission for your building.
These are typically the best channels to get through to Manchester City Council Planning department, usually you should have a case officer assigned to your planning application when your application is validated and you receive the official letter from Manchester City Council. However it's becoming more common for a phone number or email to not be supplied, likely due to low resources in these departments. Usually we'll reach out by email and call and get transferred to the correct person through:
- Phone: 0161 234 4516
- Email: planning@manchester.gov.uk
There are separate contact details for planning enforcement, building regulations and more, if you're looking for a specific department this page on Manchester City Council's website should have the details you need.
With all of this in mind, I'm going to run through some case studies so that you can see how some of the more simple planning permissions in Manchester as well as how some of the more difficult planning applications in Manchester were achieved. I'll go through the process we use for improving the chances of planning permission in Manchester and how the service provides a stress free approach for you.
I'll also be going over how we won at appeal for a planning application as well acting as our clients planning appeal consultant and building the strongest case for planning appeal approval. I'll share some key insights we can provide about how this was done. All of this should provide a blueprint for how to win a planning appeal in Manchester and some Manchester planning refusal help.
Unlike many house extension architects in Manchester, we can routinely get you more for your home during the planning application stage.
This was a house extension and dormer roof conversion project in Swinton Estate, Salford Manchester, which included a large L-shaped house extension, interior renovation and a new dormer roof conversion.
This is along the lines of a typical planning application process we provide in our architect service. However even with the most simple applications there were still areas where it could've been easy to run into trouble.
In terms of the process, these were the main steps:
- After the design was signed off with the client. The drawings and a design and access statement was submitted on the planning portal.
- We then nominated the client to pay the council application fee, something that can be done when you submit the application as an agent.
- The application was then forwarded and validated by Salford Council.
The process so far was quite routine, but once validated by Salford Council we did have trouble contacting the case officer in charge of the application, part of the routine check we do.
After persevering for a few weeks we were able to finally make contact and it was the case that the application would have been refused if we weren't able to point the case officer to the correct precedent shown in the design and access statement, demonstrating the proposal should be acceptable. We've written a full run down on the project if you'd like to get into more detail.
We believe this is what makes the difference between a regular residential architect in Manchester and the best house extension architects in Manchester, the difference in the final result really is night and day.
You can see the approved planning application on Salford Council's Planning Website.
It goes to show that even the most simple planning application can fail without care and attention from your home Manchester architect.
The design comprised a modern design with vertical timber cladding, despite it's simple premise for a planning application care was still needed to get approval.
This was a similar type of project in a very different location. The site housed a detached bungalow and the client was looking to build a rear house extension and a front porch to their house.
Most of the time with more complex site and planning applications, it's usually recommended to go for pre-application advice with the council first. This is what we did here and it actually provided a solution to the problem of the green belt building thresholds typically enforced on greenbelt dwellings.
The pre-application advice meeting with the planning officer made it apparent that the house rear extension could be achieved through permitted development, this allowed the extension to be built as outlined by permitted development without consideration for the green belt size thresholds.
However, it was important to gain permission for the porch first (which was slightly larger than what permitted development allowed) with planning permission, then build the rear extension in order to avoid passing the maximum extension threshold when the planning application was being considered.
Again, clear communication, using the pre-application effectively and good strategy ensured the client was able to build everything they needed for the house in the greenbelt, despite the complexities and roadblocks which would typically prevent other architects and house builders from achieving their plans.
You can learn more on this project through the planning approval on Sevenoaks council planning website and see more of the design on our projects page.
Interior views of the new house extension in the greenbelt.
Even when taking all the correct precautions and providing precedent. It's still possible for a planning application to be refused by the council, particularly if you're looking to do something outside of the norm.
Despite this, it is possible to win through the appeal process with the planning inspectorate. It can be very difficult and it's not often some architects can deliver, but we have been able to win on some projects during appeal.
For this project - a roof raise to two semi-detached residential dwellings - despite being a complex and unorthodox planning application which covered two separate properties and applicants, we were able to win at appeal despite the initial planning application refusal.
The key things we undertook to make this happen was:
1. Speak with the council before launching the appeal. This allowed us to debrief regarding the issues that caused the refusal in the first place and dig into them a bit more. In this case, we were able to establish the area we had a case and the planning officer was actually (frustratingly) in agreement
2. Submit the appeal with a full statement of case. Submitting a statement of case is your main chance to outline why the application should have been approved.
3. Await and follow planning inspectorate instructions. The planning inspectorate will outline who should submit what and by which date, for instance, the local authority council to submit their rebuttal to your statement of case and then the applicants further comments.
Having gone through this process, the council did not put up much of a fight to challenge the appeal and the appeal was approved, showing that it is possible to win at planning appeal with the right strategy. If you'd like to see the details of this application appeal you can find more on the council planning website.
Elevation drawings of the approved planning appeal for the roof extension to two dwellings.
While it's pretty clear from the planning permission examples, An experience architect in Manchester will also make a difference when it comes to the final cost of the project, the final design of the project and it's long term condition.
Let me outline below the main ways we usually provide this below:
It's quite typical for some architects to provide measured surveys, ourselves included. However where the similarities end is with our use of new cutting edge scanning technology. 3D site scans and models in Manchester give you an extra level of detail when surveying your site and also allow us and other professionals to provide even better service.
Our approach to producing the designs, communicating with you and capturing this efficiently prevents lengthy delays to get to your ideal building design in Manchester.
As seen in the case studies, we employ strategies we've learned over the last 10 years working with Councils across the UK to ensure your project has the highest chance of gaining planning permission in Manchester.
Our approach to building regulations approval is fast and through good planning and design foresight. This prevents a back and forth and delays for people eager to start building.
While many clients and builders will go ahead and build the project after this stage. We provide construction stage services if needed. These include contract administration between the client and the builder, site visits, additional design solutions as they're needed on-site and more involved project management.
The free initial consultation is here to provide you with everything you need to know about your new project. This includes discussing and clarifying the requirements for your project, the estimated budget you should expect, any project specific timelines and our fees.
Given the strong track record we've had delivering projects for clients in Manchester, we're very proud to share some of their kind words and testimonials they've been able to offer.
These come from people conducting house designs in Manchester, house extensions and dormer roof conversions in Manchester as well as commercial projects as well:
"Dealing with Sean has been a great experience as it was our first time using an Architect, Sean was really informative and understood our goal from minute one and shared lots of great ideas,
Maverick was prompt and efficient in the measuring survey and the whole process was completed shortly after with drawings being freely available for distribution
Would highly recommend"
Mark Cleator - Rossendale Home Renovation
"We found Sean and Maverick online and though at first I, like probably many others at the outset of a build, was wary of both cost and what an architect could do that I couldn’t.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. The step by step help at every point of the project including recruiting all the other people you need(structural engineers etc), a very clear pricing structure and just generally excellent customer care was a godsend.
The plans went straight through planning without my involvement, all the materials to spec and advice freely given when needed. Result, a beautiful extension, the pictures of which will be on their website. Well recommended."
Sam English - Burnley House Extension
"Delighted to recommend Sean and Maverick to support you through any project. Professional, knowledgeable and responsive.
In addition, they are well connected and have built a network of trusted supporting contractors. Combined with a clear pricing structure, and outline of services, they are a pleasure to work with."
Andrew Shannon - Salford L-Shape House Extension
It's through our communicative design methods that we achieve our client's vision.
"Sean was instrumental in helping us achieve our dream home. He helped us with the design, planning permission and many of the headaches through the construction stage.
From the other architects we spoke to Sean was able to provide us with great advice which made us confident he' was the right choice."
"Sean is simply awesome. Sean is a highly competent architect and the standard of his work and quality of presentations really is 5 stars. Before engaging Sean my partner and I undertook a review of all local architects and interviewed 3.
Sean was competitively priced and seemed very knowledgeable and his fee/work proposal was the best by far. Throughout all stages of the project Sean has been contactable for advice and I would have no problem recommending him. we would certainly use his services again."
"Sean and Maverick were fantastic from start to finish in helping us achieve our house extension and refurbishment project to our house.
Everything from the planning permission, building regulations and construction were streamlined and managed with ease, if you're looking for an architect I'd have to recommend them."
"Of all the bids Sean was the only one that understood exactly what I needed and offered a fixed fee. Working with him was a pleasure, took the time to explain things and the turnaround was very impressive. I am a very pleased client and would highly recommend."
In addition to the kind words we've received back from our clients, we're often told what made us different to other architects and put us ahead of others when doing a building project in Manchester.
Our aim is to be the best house extension architects in Manchester through our consistent output for our customers providing the following:
Clearly outlining the whole process - One of the things I want every client to feel is that they know exactly how the process works from the get go.
Fixed Prices For Architect Services - While other architects will emphasize a percentage rate or time charge for many parts of their service. We focus on giving you fixed transparent fees right from the start for you project in Manchester.
Attention to Detail with Quick Results - We've been refining our workflow over 10 years, making it extremely efficient, fast and high quality.
Clear communication with all our Clients - In my opinion the most important part of our service is our ability to communicate and listen to you. This avoids the typical pitfalls that can occur between a designer and a client and puts the focus on the best project that works for you.
If all of that sounds of interest or there's a particular question about a project I wasn't able to answer here, please feel free to book a free consultation by clicking here or scrolling below.
Our focus is on producing the best quality architecture with a solid plan and no unpleasant surprises.
Having worked in the construction industry and within architecture for the last 15 years, I've seen everything from the very best to the very questionable.
My focus over the last 6 years has been on bringing the very best in energy efficient architecture and high design to the small scale.
Book in with an architect here to learn more about how you can build a project in Manchester, the process start to finish and the key permissions you need.
