I’ll admit I’ve snorted at the fees demanded by architects to project manage a build.
I’m not snorting now.
I’ve just spent 30 minutes providing a detailed explanation of our roof cladding requirements to a bloke who, it turns out, I’d asked to quote for our stairs. He must think I’m barking. He asked for a picture of where it was going.
Bemused, I sent him a photo. 
He tried to explain the coarse, sharp-edged character of galvanised steel… did I not want a powder coating?
I robustly rejected that option.
When I finally twigged and confessed with horror that while he’d been talking stairs I’d been talking roofs, he admitted to wondering why I’d been going on about an overhang and a 30° pitch.
I nearly ordered a corrugated steel staircase.
And then there’s the ongoing saga of those bloody windows. Supplier selected, deposit paid, FULL AND FINAL DETAILS to be submitted by the end of the month to secure our October production date(!!) for these beauties from Velfac:
Decisions and questions and details which are sorely exposing my limited knowledge. Stir in half a pound of building regs and a cupful of *SAP requirements and combine to create the perfect soup of confusion.
*The Standard Assessment Procedure for the Energy Rating of Dwellings (SAP) was developed by BRE based on the BRE Domestic Energy Model (BREDEM) and was published by BRE and the Department of the Environment in 1992. In 1994 it was first cited in Part L of the building regulations and it has now been adopted by the UK Government as the methodology for calculating the energy performance of dwellings.
The most recent version, SAP 2012, came into force for building regulations compliance on 6 April 2014. The 2009 version SAP 2009 may still be used on projects for which transitional arrangements apply, see 2013 changes to the approved documents for part L of the building regulations for more information.
You stopped reading that definition after five words, didn’t you? So did I.
I asked the window suppliers to make sure I’d met the building reg requirements for fire escapes. Their emailed reply was somewhat cryptic:
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Study 1 can be used as means of fire escape
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Study 2 cannot be used as means of fire escape
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Bedroom 2 west elevation cannot be used as means of fire escape
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Bedroom 2 west elevation can be used as a means of fire escape
Given that Study 1 and study 2 have exactly the same windows… and that bullet points 3 and 4 are actually the same window, and bedroom 2 faces south-east… um, does anyone think that makes sense?
Here’s a flowchart to illustrate my current confusion:
How much did that architect want? Trust me, it’s a steal.
Sam Russell 