A Tale of Two Clients

"We never used architects’ plans when building Balthazar.

As ideas came, we simply scribbled crude drawings on whichever bits of paper were within reach.

Whatever I might have saved on an architect’s fees, I spent more on fixing my endless mistakes." 

I've been thinking of two people this month, one is someone who asked me to redesign his house many years ago, the other is a famous restaurateur in NYC. They both started with the same notion: they didn’t need an architect to achieve their vision. 

A Stitch in Time Saves $250,000

The first guy, let’s call him Steve, had spent about $250,000 over a few years doing piecemeal renovations on his house without an architect, and it showed. Some parts felt like a corporate office, some like a home, but all of it was a big jumble that didn't work together technically, aesthetically, or functionally. My proposed fee at the time was around $30,000. Despite having spent a quarter-million on what he described to me as a failure, Steve was shocked at the amount to make it right. We went through a phase of reducing the scope of work to a much smaller area, and, per his request, making a contract for only for one phase at a time.  I presented him with a design phase proposal for about $8,000. He wrote a kind email about how he had decided not to go through with the project. Regardless of how comfortable he was spending on “things”, he couldn't bring himself to invest in professional services.

The second guy was Keith McNally, the owner of Balthazar, a restaurant in New York City that became iconic immediately after its opening in 1997. He just wrote a piece in Vanity Fair about opening the restaurant, how it evolved, and closing the restaurant during Covid. The part that stood out to me was this: 

"We never used architects’ plans when building Balthazar. As ideas came, we simply scribbled crude drawings on whichever bits of paper were within reach. Whatever I might have saved on an architect’s fees, I spent more on fixing my endless mistakes." 

Read that last sentence again. 

“Whatever I might have saved on an architect’s fees, I spent more on fixing my endless mistakes.” 

Balthazar was an instant success, giving him the opportunity to open more restaurants. For all his post-Balthazar restaurants, he worked with an architect. He learned from his mistakes and did not repeat them with subsequent restaurant projects. We call this sort of thing wisdom. Where does wisdom come from? Good judgement. Good judgement comes from experience. Where does experience come from? Bad judgement. I did not make this statement up, I learned it from someone smarter than me. Every wise architect who is using good judgement is building upon their own experience and the collective wisdom in our profession.

“You do not need to make endless mistakes! ”

You do not need to make endless mistakes! Opening your wallet for $5000 worth of last minute fixes is not fun. That money doesn’t go to its best use. Far from it. You may only do one big renovation or new construction project in your lifetime. Why experiment and struggle on your own project when you can rely on professional wisdom to achieve your dreams? 

Dabbling in a Full Time Enterprise

After the 2008 stock market crash, I considered doing my own stock trading. I thought I had the time and the thrill of a well-timed trade can be addictive. Then it dawned on me that I would have to spend all day researching companies in order to make intelligent choices. Seeing an opportunity is not enough. Around this time, a stock broker friend was complaining about losing out on a trade because his employee didn’t process it fast enough. Was it hours, minutes? No, he was too slow by seconds. Your choices have to be made at lighting speed to capitalize on the stock market. For someone like me that likes to marinade with ideas and examine them from many angles, this was not for me. Just because I could trade did not mean I had the expertise to execute it and win. Now, I trust my financial advisor to do what she does best. My statements thank me.

“Just changing the roof color from black to white requires very different roof detailing to avoid costly damage.”

To dive deeper into the technical realm, our building industry is changing at a rapid pace. I spend considerable time and money to educate myself on the latest building science; going into minutiae and variable scenarios to be prepared for a multitude of design conditions. As construction gets more expensive, new materials and products enter the market. For example, we used to sheath houses in plywood, now we use OSB. Their purpose is the same - to provide shear strength to a building’s frame - but their water absorption properties are very different, which means we detail certain building types differently. Using an old way of doing things could have disastrous implications. Even changing a roof from black to white will dramatically change the temperature of the roof, which changes how fast surface water evaporates, which in turn changes how we detail that roof to avoid mold, warped structures, and cracks in the ceilings. Yes, changing the color of your roof without changing the whole roof assembly details can lead to very costly problems. See where I’m going with this?

Open Up The Ferrari

“The latent potential of architects is GIGANTIC. We are givers, futurists, empaths, visionaries. ”

Architects seem to be a mysterious bunch to many people. We dress in all black, use words like interstitial and charette (both as a noun and verb, of course), and charge so much more than a “home designer” or “my cousin Larry who knows CAD”. That mystery can serve you well when you’re single and want to impress the ladies with your cool, creative, yet practical profession. It goes against us when we want to share with the world all the good we can do. The latent potential of architects is GIGANTIC. We are givers, futurists, empaths, visionaries. We stayed up all night in our late teens and early 20’s, not at frat parties, but at our design studio tables learning our craft by doing, taking ideas apart, imagining ways of living from new angles. Have I convinced you yet to hire an architect? Do not stop there. Hire an architect who inspires you. We can give you so much more than what you’ve seen before or even what you think you want. Hiring an architect just to “draft up plans” for your ideas is like taking a Ferrari to the corner deli. Yes, it’ll get you there, but the potential for an exhilarating adventure has been wasted. We are capable of exceeding your dreams. 

From rendering to reality: this rendering and elevation (one of the 18 drawings for this room) describe the many design ideas coordinated together to make for a smooth construction process. They guide us through construction to know what to fight for and what can be changed en-route to realizing our vision.

Architect fees may seem like a lot to invest in before buying the 2x4's and bathroom tiles. However, we provide a service that makes the overall design beautiful, harmonious, technically sound, and functional to your specific needs. Before construction, our preparations facilitate a smooth bidding and construction period. Bidders know just what they are getting into when they see our plans and specifications. When there's ambiguity or no plan during construction, thousands of dollars fly out the window without much time to lament their passing. There are always some surprises during construction, but if you have a vision and have as much as possible figured out beforehand, those surprises are much smaller and easier to face, both financially and emotionally. The result? Happy client, happy contractor, happy architect.

Don’t be the next Steve (or Keith).
Save yourself the stress — hire the architect before the mistakes. Book your free consultation now.