Making good design more accessible
We believe architectural and urbanism services can only improve people's lives if more communities and organisations can access them.
We have put a great deal of thought into what it actually takes to run an architectural practice designed for the common good. Every process detailed below—from how we calculate our fair fees to how we structure co-design workshops—has been carefully considered to strip away traditional industry barriers and offer genuine structural transparency.
Skip directly to a section:
Architectural Service Tiers ↓ — Our three core delivery frameworks.
Our Co-Design Methodology ↓ — How we embed communities into the design process.
How We Calculate Fees ↓ — Our time-based fee model.
The Initiator Session (Free Session on Offer) ↓ — Agile, low-risk option to kickstart your project.
Our Service Tiers
Service Tier 1
Essential
A streamlined framework focused on unlocking site viability, establishing user-led briefs, and securing the statutory planning permissions required to move your project forward. This design-only service is optimised for civic partners securing early-stage capital grants, experienced self-builders, or straightforward retrofits where construction oversight is managed directly by your delivery team.
What’s Included:
✓ Technical site capacity testing and early strategic appraisals
✓ Participatory planning alignments and user-led brief formulation
✓ Exact design documentation for local authority planning submissions
✓ Basic Building Regulations information packages
What’s Excluded:
✕ Detailed internal joinery, material scheduling, and bespoke interior architecture
✕ Full contractor procurement, tendering frameworks, and competitive cost management
✕ On-site contract administration and construction oversight
Relevant Project Types: Stage-one community asset transfers, municipal infill site appraisals, experienced self-builders, and early-stage high street activation frameworks.
Service Tier 2
Full Design Services
Our complete, concept-to-completion service engineered for community groups, civic organizations, and homeowners seeking full professional support. We dedicate significant time early on to building capacity within your group through immersive workshops, producing a comprehensive construction package that guarantees competitive contractor pricing, and administering the building contract on-site to protect your financial clarity and shared equity.
What’s Included:
✓ Deep community engagement, co-design workshops, and stakeholder alignment
✓ Early healthy material specification and strict value management
✓ Creative options testing to ensure the design is a shared vision
✓ Exhaustive construction documentation for transparent contractor tendering
✓ Rigorous quality control
What’s Excluded:
✕ Complex 3D building physics, thermal bridging analysis, and energy payback tracking
✕ Micro-detailing for specialist artisan fabrications or artist commissions
Relevant Project Types: Multi-home community-led housing schemes, high street enterprise hubs, responsive neighbourhood masterplans, and community-owned asset developments.
Service Tier 3
Crafted Performance
Designed for progressive clients, intentional communities, and public bodies aiming to achieve exemplary environmental performance, absolute climate resilience, and healthy, non-toxic spaces. We deploy advanced 3D building physics to calculate exact energy payback periods and collaborate hand-in-glove with specialist craftspeople to embed long-term physical well-being directly into your building's fabric.
What’s Included:
✓ Advanced 3D environmental performance modelling and carbon/energy payback analysis
✓ High-performance, fabric-first architectural detailing (Passivhaus / EnerPHit paths)
✓ Material sourcing focused entirely on local supply chains and non-toxic, breathable construction
✓ Direct integration with specialist ecological fabricators, timber frame designers, and artists
✓ Immersive 3D virtual walkthroughs and expanded, highly collaborative design reviews
What’s Excluded:
✕ Rapid, low-involvement delivery timelines (requires deep design discipline)
Relevant Project Types: Certified Passivhaus new builds, deep domestic energy retrofits, pioneering ecological co-housing communities, and climate-resilient civic infrastructure.
Co-design and Engagement
Designed for community land trusts, co-housing collectives, and progressive local authorities, our co-design services deliver tailored participatory workshops and actionable spatial strategies. We reject passive box-ticking, adapting our delivery format and methodology to fit the exact scale and social dynamics of your project.
Responsive Frameworks for Local Impact
We match our architectural tools to your specific goals. For community strategies and high street action plans, we deploy Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) and the action-planning principles of architect Nabeel Hamdi to map and mobilise existing local assets. For co-housing, homes, and the spaces in between, we utilise specialised collective-living frameworks that balance individual privacy with democratic, shared stewardship.
The Three Pillars of Our Framework
Regardless of the project scale, our interactive process follows a familiar sequence:
Deep Listening & Asset Mapping We begin on the ground to map local capacity. For civic plans, this means surveying existing community networks and economic capital; for housing groups, it involves facilitating collective visioning sessions to align shared values before drawing a single line.
Interactive Spatial Testing We bring design out from behind closed doors, co-creating layout alternatives live using physical models, digital workshops, or on-site testing. This converts complex planning regulations into highly accessible visual choices for homes, streets, or public rooms.
Tangible Roadmaps & Stewardship We synthesise workshop data into a high-stature Visual Feedback Report or Spatial Strategy. This document provides the robust social proof needed to satisfy statutory consultation and unlock capital grants, while leaving your group with a clear blueprint to steward the asset.
Why We Work This Way
Traditional development isolates design behind closed doors, treating communities as passives liabilities to be managed. Whether shaping a masterplan or a neighbourhood layout, our adaptable frameworks turn the design process into an engine for community wealth building—radically de-risking the planning process because the people who use the space are the ones who engineered its purpose.
Fees & Investment
Sliding Scale: £1,200 to £4,500+ + VAT (Per Workshop)
Our investment tiers adapt flexibly rather than enforcing a one-size-fits-all rate. The final resource allocation is balanced against site complexity, participant numbers, and the required depth of advanced architectural reporting.
Every session fee completely covers bespoke materials, expert on-site facilitation by our cooperative team, and a visual feedback document engineered to drive your project directly into its next funding phase.
Many of our projects include some level of co-design or engagement. This image is from our work designing a 50 home eco-village with Bowden Pillars Future and Transition by Design
How do we charge?
Unlike some architects, we do not base our fees on a percentage of anticipated construction costs. Because we specialise in adaptive reuse, co-housing, and ecological homes, we know that a project's complexity rarely matches neatly with its build budget. Instead, we provide fixed fees based on the complexity of the project and a detailed set of deliverables.
Fixed-Stage Security: We estimate the time your project requires using past project benchmarks, providing fixed-fee proposals for each phase so your costs won’t fluctuate unexpectedly.
Cooperative Accountability: As a worker cooperative, our hourly rates are calculated fairly to support our team and reinvest in public good, meaning our fees are driven by actual delivery costs, not profit maximisation.
Deep Alignment: The process of calculating time constraints early on forces us to look closely at your budget, timeline, and site complexities before we draw a single line—ensuring our architectural services are perfectly right-sized for your goals.
As part of our Initial Design Session with Project Home Housing Coop we explored how the buildings on their site could expand their living space.
The Community-Funded Initiator Sessions
Open for Applications
We believe spatial expertise should be accessible. Twice a year, our democratic studio awards four community groups a fully funded architectural diagnostic day (valued at £750 + VAT) to kickstart their projects.
Next Review Cycles: 16th March | 16th September
Supported by: Cooperatives UK and Community Land Trust Network
Case Study Focus: Initial Design Session work delivered for Nudge Community Builders, Plymouth.
Are you eligible?
If you are a CLT, a community-led group, or a civic organization exploring heritage retrofits, high street activation, or affordable community housing, you can apply.
Kickstart your project
The Initiator Session
An intensive, low-barrier diagnostic service designed to kickstart your project, clarify site viability, and generate the spatial vision needed to unlock early-stage funding. This structured service includes a deep-dive on-site workshop, rapid conceptual sketching, and a strategic recommendation summary.
What to Expect
The Initiator Session represents a full dedicated day of our team's technical focus, engineered to deliver maximum strategic impact. It is a collaborative opportunity to audit your site’s unique physical context, map out your collective goals, and challenge your brief. We then provide an immediate, high-energy architectural response—turning abstract ideas into a tangible, physical direction that sparks action.
Why We Offer This
Traditional architectural procurement often forces groups to invest heavily in costly, comprehensive surveys before they even know if a concept is viable or fundable. We choose to work differently. This session breaks that financial deadlock, providing grassroots organisations, community land trusts, and civic groups with the swift, agile spatial assets required to back up grant applications and prove project viability from day one.
Fees & Investment
Fixed Fee: £750 + VAT
100% Deductible: To make this initial step entirely risk-free, the full cost of the Initiator Session is credited back against your fees if you choose to move forward with us into our main service frameworks.
