Example site for an entirely fictional business — not a real company.
Something like this for you?Services
We offer all nine work stages and will take on individual ones — as long as it stays clear who carries responsibility for what.
Fees follow a published fee scale for design work, normally band III. Anything outside it we agree as an hourly rate, and we say in advance how many hours we expect.
Measured on site, plans and sections of the actual condition, plus an assessment of structure, damp and whether consent is likely. Afterwards you know whether the project is worth doing — regardless of whether you carry on with us.
from $1,200
Brief, concept, developed design, application drawings. We put the design forward in variants, because the real question usually only surfaces with the second proposal.
under the fee scale
Full submission to the building authority, with structural calculations, certificates and the consultants' contributions coordinated. We answer the authority's queries without passing them on to you.
included in stage 4
Working drawings at 1:50 and 1:20, schedules of work, tenders gathered and compared. We let trade by trade rather than to a single main contractor: more coordination, and as a rule less money.
under the fee scale
Program, checking invoices, handover, chasing defects. On conversions we are on site at least once a week, because that is where the decisions arise that no drawing can anticipate.
under the fee scale
An inspection before the defects liability period runs out, defects documented and put to the contractors. It is the appointment clients forget most often — we remind you in good time.
under the fee scale
An hour, free of charge. You describe what you have in mind, we say what of it is realistic. Sometimes it ends there, and that is also a result.
We measure the building ourselves and redraw plans and sections. The drawings held by the authority almost never match what was actually built.
Two or three possibilities, each with what it costs and what it demands. Which one we think is right, we say.
Submitted with the consultants' contributions and all certificates. In Portland it currently takes four to seven months from submission to approval.
Let trade by trade, site visit weekly, a cost statement monthly. At the end, handover and an ordered set of every document you will still need in ten years.
For existing buildings there is no honest figure. Two houses of the same size can be far apart, depending on what appears once the plaster comes off. After the survey we will name a range; before it, we would be guessing.
Yes, if the design is settled and we think it will get consent. We check it first — we can only sign what we can stand behind.
Structure, building physics and services come from three practices we have worked with for years. They are appointed by the client directly so the contracts stay clean; the coordination is ours.
Yes, mostly on infill plots and mostly housing. The starting point is then the neighborhood rather than the existing fabric; the approach stays the same.
For a conversion of an occupied house, rarely under eighteen months, of which close to six are planning and consent. If you have to move in sooner, say so at the first meeting — then we plan differently, or decline.
Bring what exists: old drawings, photographs, the energy certificate. Whatever is missing, we obtain.
Wheeler Kesteven Architects is invented — the way it is built is not. None of this is work delivered for a client. It is the shape we would give such a project — with the same depth, but without a client who would have to answer for it.
Wheeler Kesteven Architects work on housing and on existing buildings, across all nine work stages. Anyone commissioning them either has a plot or a house that should stay — and in both cases rarely knows what an architect actually does. So the site has to do two things at once: show work and explain scope.
Projects on their own page, not as an endless gallery
The home page carries a selection; the full gallery sits one level down. That leaves room for the text about how the practice works — the first thing to disappear on a pure image page.
Work stages written out
“Work stages 1 to 9” tells a client nothing. So the services page sets them out as a sequence of steps, with expandable questions covering exactly the points that always come up in a first meeting.
A quiet archetype, but muted color
The same restrained archetype as the law firm, with a different palette and a motif built from plan, elevation and section. Two businesses share the attitude and part company in the imagery.
Deliberately left outNo named client quotes and no price range. A fee depends on construction cost and scope; a number on the website would either be wrong or so hedged that it says nothing.
Five pages, in all four languages. Navigation, the gallery with its enlarged view and the expandable questions all respond. Indicated only: every project image — schematic drawings stand in for photographs, because an invented practice has no real buildings.
Project pages instead of captions
Each project with its own page: brief, existing fabric, intervention, figures, photographer and clearance. That is the real scope of work for an architecture practice.
Image rights
Architectural photography is licensed. Using it means usage rights, credits, and an archive that still proves both a few years later.
Applications
The news list attracts graduates. Behind it belongs a route by which portfolios actually arrive, without a mailbox failing on a file size.
This demo took a few days. Your real site gets your content, your brand and your inquiry flow.
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