‘Drawings for a house’ is one phrase covering four different documents, produced at four different stages, for four different readers. Confusing them is the most common reason a London homeowner pays twice. This page sets out what each set contains, who reads it, what it costs and the order they are produced in, so you can buy the one you actually need.
MCIAT chartered drawings for planning, building regs, lofts and extensions — fixed fees 30% below typical London architects. Tell us what you need and we’ll reply the same working day.
A domestic project produces four distinct drawing sets, and each one exists to satisfy a different reader. The measured survey records the building as it stands. The planning set persuades a planning officer that the proposal is acceptable in principle. The building regulations set proves to a building control body that it will be safe and efficient once built. The construction set tells the builder what to order and in what sequence.
They are not interchangeable, and a set produced for one reader will be rejected by another. A planning drawing shows massing, materials and the relationship to neighbours; it carries no U-values, no beam sizes and no fire strategy, because a planning officer has no remit over any of them. A building regulations drawing carries all three and says almost nothing about how the extension looks from the street. Handing a builder a planning pack is the classic false economy: it is dimensionally correct and structurally silent.
The order matters as much as the content. Every later set is drawn on top of the survey, so an inaccurate survey propagates into the planning application, the regulations pack and the build. A 60mm error in a party wall thickness is invisible on a planning elevation and expensive when the steel arrives.
The existing-condition drawing is the foundation of the other three. It records floor levels, wall thicknesses, window and door openings, ceiling heights, drainage positions, structural openings and the position of the boundary. On a London terrace it also records the shared elements the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 will turn into a legal question later: the party wall itself, the chimney breasts built into it, and any structure within three metres of it.
Councils validate against measurable content, not artistry. An application is invalidated for a missing scale bar, a north point absent from the site plan, or elevations that do not match the block plan far more often than for a design objection. A survey done properly removes that entire failure mode, which is why our survey is a site visit rather than a request for your own measurements.
Existing drawings are produced at 1:50 for plans and sections and 1:100 for elevations, with a location plan at 1:1250 and a block plan at 1:500 — the scales English councils require for a householder application. Where a scheme touches a party structure, the survey also captures the neighbouring property's window and door positions, because daylight and overlooking objections are argued from exactly those dimensions.
A householder planning application in England needs existing and proposed plans, existing and proposed elevations, a site location plan and a block plan, plus the application form and fee. The statutory householder fee is £258, and the council has eight weeks from validation to determine it. A full application for a new dwellinghouse is £578 and runs to thirteen weeks.
Where the work is permitted development, the drawings do a different job: they evidence compliance with the limits in the General Permitted Development Order, so a Lawful Development Certificate under section 192 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 can be issued. That application costs £129 — half the householder fee — and produces a document a conveyancing solicitor will accept on sale.
| Application | Fee | Statutory period |
|---|---|---|
| Householder planning | £258 | 8 weeks |
| Full — new dwellinghouse | £578 | 13 weeks |
| Lawful Development Certificate | £129 | 8 weeks |
| Larger home extension prior approval | £120 | 6 weeks |
The single-storey rear extension limits are worth memorising before commissioning anything: 3m beyond the original rear wall on a semi or terrace, 4m on a detached house, doubling to 6m and 8m under the prior approval route with its 21-day neighbour consultation. Height is capped at 4m, and at 3m within two metres of a boundary.
The regulations set is technical. It carries the fire strategy under Part B, the thermal performance under Part L, ventilation under Part F, stair geometry under Part K, drainage under Part H and the structural design under Part A. The drawings state target values explicitly, because the inspector checks against them on site rather than inferring intent.
The numbers recur on almost every domestic job. Part L expects around 0.18 W/m²K for a new wall, 0.16 for a roof, 1.4 for a window and 2.2 for a rooflight. Part F sets extract rates of 30 l/s over a hob, 15 l/s for a bathroom and 6 l/s continuous for a utility. Part K wants a maximum 42° pitch on a domestic stair with 220mm going. A loft conversion adds Part B's protected escape route, FD30 doors and a 0.33m² openable escape window where the floor is within 4.5m of ground level.
Two routes exist for approval. A Full Plans application has the drawings checked before work starts, with a decision period of five weeks extendable to eight by agreement; a Building Notice starts work without that check and carries the risk of being told to open up completed work. On anything structural we submit Full Plans, because a written approval is what a future buyer's solicitor asks to see.
For a straightforward rear extension built by a firm that builds them weekly, the regulations set is usually enough to price and build from. Where a construction set earns its fee is complexity and dispute: a steel frame with more than one connection, an open-plan ground floor with a flitch beam, a basement, or any job where three builders returned three wildly different prices.
The reason prices diverge is that each builder has priced a different scheme. A construction set removes the ambiguity: it fixes the specification, the junctions and the sequence, so quotes become comparable and variations become visible. On a £70,000 build a 10% spread is £7,000 — several times the cost of the drawings that would have closed it.
We publish fixed fees rather than a percentage of build cost. A planning drawing package is £840. Planning plus building regulations plus structural calculations is £1,750. A loft conversion package is £1,225, a mansard £1,575, a basement £1,950 and a garage conversion £995. A standalone measured survey is £540 and structural calculations alone are £350.
The percentage model, still common among London architects, ties the designer's fee to how much you spend building — which is a strange incentive on a domestic job where the client wants the opposite. A percentage fee on a £55,000 dormer commonly lands between £4,500 and £8,000 for the same drawing set. Our fixed fees sit roughly 30% below typical London architect rates and do not move if the build cost does.
Statutory fees are separate and paid to the council: £258 for the householder application, £129 for a certificate, £120 for prior approval. Building control charges vary by authority and by whether you use the council or an approved inspector, so we quote those per job rather than pretending a national figure exists.
Nothing — they are the same documents described with different words. The meaningful distinction is not in the name but in the purpose: a planning drawing argues that a proposal is acceptable in principle, a building regulations drawing proves it is safe and efficient, and a construction drawing tells a builder how to assemble it. Ask which of those three you are buying, not what the drawing is called.
You can, and we would advise against it on any building older than about 1970. London stock brick terraces are rarely square, floor levels frequently step between the original house and a later rear addition, and party wall thicknesses vary within a single property. Every later drawing is built on the survey, so an error there reappears in the planning application, the regulations pack and the steel order.
We survey within a few days of instruction and produce planning drawings in 14 to 20 working days, a building regulations pack in 18 to 24, and a combined package in 20 to 28. The council's own clock starts after that: eight weeks for a householder application, five weeks for a Full Plans building control decision. Those statutory periods are outside anyone's control.
You do not need planning permission, but you still need building regulations drawings, because permitted development is a planning concept and has no bearing on structural or fire safety. We also recommend a Lawful Development Certificate at £129: without one, you are relying on your own reading of the General Permitted Development Order, and a buyer's solicitor will ask you to evidence it years later.
A chartered architectural technologist. 'Architect' is a title protected by the Architects Act 1997 and describes a profession weighted toward concept design; architectural technology, chartered under CIAT's Royal Charter of 2005, is the discipline of technical design and construction detail. For a domestic extension, loft or conversion, the technical set is the work, which is why our fees are lower for the same deliverable.
No, and this is the single most expensive misunderstanding we see. A planning set is dimensionally correct but structurally silent: no beam sizes, no U-values, no fire strategy, no junction details. A builder pricing from it is guessing at the expensive parts, which is why quotes drawn from planning drawings vary so widely.
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