Drawings Can Protect the Client from Construction Mistakes
Interior designers spend hours and hours documenting your project. Clear, detailed drawings protects our clients from mistakes made during construction. Less mistakes means less headaches and less unexpected expenses for our clients.
When I have a boutique consultation with a client and show them a project example, they’re often impressed with the amount of drawings we produce, even if it’s a relatively small project. We don’t produce these sets of drawings because we think it’s funzies. Drawings are our way of assessing and investigating potential issues and providing solutions as part of the design. Our goal to have as few issues during construction as possible.
Half of our job is about clear communication
Contractors aren’t mind readers. Half of the issues during construction can be avoided with clear documentation. The more information that we can provide about a project in our drawings, the better. If you’re looking to install shower tile in a herringbone pattern—we don’t just note it, we draw it. That is the clearest way to convey how we want that tile installed. Plus, you’d be surprised how often herringbone and chevron patterns are confused. Imagine walking into your new bathroom that was tiled in the wrong pattern!
Drawings can save our clients money
We redesigned an outdated bathroom that happened to be quite narrow. The design involved the design of a custom vanity. The piece was designed so that the top drawer provided as much storage space as possible. The vanity we designed had two large functioning drawers. The only way to make this was to have understanding of plumbing and to specify a specific p-trap that was also shown in the section drawing. A section drawing shows what a room or element would look like if you sliced through it. It’s a helpful drawing to show how a built-in should be constructed.
During install the craftsman that we hired to construct the vanity went to site to confirm measurements. He let me know that instead of relocating the p-trap as I specified, the contractor kept the p-trap at the same height. I promptly looked through our office project binder, which is identical to the binder that we keep onsite. I reviewed the drawing to make sure I included all the appropriate information. I had. The contractor insisted it was a mistake on our end and the client didn’t want to be charged to move the shift the plumbing. However, I wasn’t worried—our drawings are another form of insurance.
I went to site and reviewed the binder with the contractor. He said he had no idea that the vanity had a top drawer. So I flipped through the drawings and pointed this out (highlighted in red):
Not only did I draw the drawers in section, I also had a note that said “overlay drawer fronts.” Further, we had included this particular p-trap in the plumbing package so the piece was already onsite for install. Since I had these drawings on hand, the contractor had to address this issue without charging my client. And we didn’t need to make any changes to their beautiful custom vanity.
To be clear, this contractor was fantastic and nobody is perfect. But, our drawings saved my clients an unexpected expense during construction.
In fact, our drawings are so detailed that things like this usually don’t happen. One of the reasons we don’t outsource any of our drawings is because we like to be thorough—many interior designers and architects don’t provide the level of detail that we do. Further, we don’t need to outsource our drawings because we have such a clear understanding of construction and detailing that we have the ability to develop the documentation ourselves.