Almost all domestic projects follow the same initial 4 stages:

1.       Measured Survey/Site Survey

2.       Design Development

3.       Planning Application

4.       Building Regulations Application

Stages 1&2:

The measured survey is important – it is what all proposed drawings will be based upon, so ensuring you have an accurate starting point is crucial.  As such it is worthwhile investing in a good survey.  Simply spending an hour or two taking two or three dimensions in each room is not enough to produce a good quality set of drawings. 

We would usually advise a measured survey of the whole house, especially when considering internal alterations.  The project may not directly affect the upper floors for example but knowing where the upper walls (etc) are located is crucial when developing designs for a new space.  It will also save time and cost of a structural engineer attending site to confirm this at a later stage.

Stage 3:

Planning drawings are generally quite basic drawings.  It is not necessary (or wise) to spend the time producing fully detailed drawings for this stage as you may not be granted permission, or you may need to make alterations, in which case that time and effort would be wasted.

It is actually possible for these to be very basic hand sketches and still achieve Planning permission, however, overly basic drawings will often result in numerous ‘Planning Conditions’ each requiring further applications (additional time & cost) to sign these off.  It is relatively common to have 1 or maybe 2 but more than this on a typical domestic project is a sign of not providing enough information in the first place.

As you can undoubtedly tell then, Planning drawings should be a balance between the two.  A good, concise, set of planning drawings will avoid lengthy planning conditions without being unnecessarily detailed.

Stage 4:

Building Regulations drawings show additional detail to demonstrate compliance with the various regulations.  Many aspects of the Building Regulations can be ‘ticked off’ by noting that “the X will comply with Y”.  Building Control will sign this off and get you through this stage, but the onus then falls on the contractor to obtain agreement from Building Control at a later stage while on site.  Decisions made on site can lead to delays and costs, therefore the best way to approach the Building Regulations is to explain HOW ‘X will comply with Y’ rather than simply saying that it will.  Investment in this stage will ultimately save time and cost later down the line.