House design and planning in one London package.

Most planning problems start in the design. A rear extension drawn without looking at the neighbour’s kitchen window, a dormer that ignores the rhythm of the terrace, a side infill that forgets the boundary wall: the case officer spots each of them in the first read, and then the drawings go back and forth. When the person designing the house is the same person who will defend it to the council, those questions are settled at the sketch stage, before a fee is paid to anyone.

That is the reason this is one package rather than two. We do not produce a design and then hand it to someone else to “make it planning-friendly”. The options we show you have already been tested against the local plan, the borough’s design guidance and the practical limits on the plot. When you pick one, it is ready to draw up, not ready to be argued over.

It also keeps the money honest. The design work, the drawing set, the submission and the correspondence with the planning officer are one fixed fee. You are not billed again when the officer asks for a revised elevation, and the Essentials and Complete packages include a free resubmission if the application is refused.

The survey is where it starts. A measured survey of the house gives us the true wall positions, floor levels and window heights, and every later drawing is built on it. Designs drawn over estate-agent floor plans tend to fail at the section drawing, where a ceiling turns out lower than the brochure said.

Householder applications are the largest category the planning system handles, and most are granted. Nationally, just over half of all planning decisions in England are householder decisions, and nine in ten of those are approved. That average hides a lot: a modest rear extension on an unlisted house is a different proposition from a roof extension in a conservation area. What the figures do show is that a well-prepared, policy-compliant householder scheme is the normal, expected route, not a gamble.

The eight-week clock only starts once the council validates the application. Missing drawings, a location plan without the red line, or the wrong fee all stop it before it starts. That is why the submission stage matters as much as the design.

Part of designing a house is knowing which route it takes. The Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015 allows many householder extensions without an application, as long as they stay within set limits. Class A covers extensions to the house and Class B covers additions to the roof, such as a rear dormer.

If your design fits within those limits, a planning application is the wrong tool. We would design to the limits and apply for a Lawful Development Certificate, which costs £274 for a single house and gives you, and a future buyer’s solicitor, written confirmation that the work was lawful. Our permitted development drawings are prepared for exactly that route. Where a larger single-storey extension, up to 6 m on an attached house, is worth pursuing, the prior approval route costs £249 and involves neighbour consultation.

If the design needs more than permitted development allows, we say so early, and we design the strongest scheme the local policies will support rather than the largest one you could imagine.

A householder application is judged on its drawings. The officer needs to see where the site is, what exists now and what will exist afterwards, at scales that can be measured. We draw every set from the survey, so dimensions on the plans agree with the elevations and sections.

On top of those, the set carries existing and proposed floor plans, existing and proposed elevations of every face that changes, and a section through the new work wherever levels or roof form change. Where the site is in a conservation area we add a heritage statement. Where a neighbour’s light is in question we test the scheme against the 45-degree rule before the officer does.

That depends on your house and your plans, and we will not pretend otherwise. What the published figures say is that London prices have been falling slowly, while remaining roughly double the UK average. For many households that makes adding a bedroom or a larger kitchen more attractive than paying moving costs on a bigger house, but the sums are yours to run.

What we can control is the cost of getting to a decision. A house extension or a loft conversion taken through design, planning and building regulations drawings under one fixed fee gives you a known number before any builder is asked to price the work.