01
Custom Home Design
New builds and full rebuilds. Floor plans, elevations and sections developed around your site, your lot's zoning limits and the way you want to live in the house. Drawings prepared for permit submission.
Custom home design, renovation design concepts and kitchen design, drawn by people who then build the thing. Working in Ottawa since 1999.
A building designer in Ottawa has to draw for two audiences, the homeowner and the plans examiner at City Hall. Call (613) 261-4861 to talk through your project.
We have drawn and built across this city since 1999. That means our concepts already account for what the framing crew will hit, what the inspector will look for, and what the budget will actually carry.
Plenty of homeowners arrive with drawings that cannot be built for the number they were quoted. We would rather solve that on paper, where changes are cheap.
Three service lines, all leading into a buildable set of drawings.
Each service below has its own page with the detail on how we do it, what it costs and how long it takes. We cover custom home design, renovation design concepts and kitchen design.
New builds and full rebuilds. Floor plans, elevations and sections developed around your site, your lot's zoning limits and the way you want to live in the house. Drawings prepared for permit submission.
Layout options for opening up a main floor, reworking a second storey or adding on. We produce two or three concepts, price the differences, and then develop the one you choose.
Cabinet layouts, appliance placement, lighting plans and elevations. Working triangle, drawer versus door storage, and where the fridge door lands when someone else is at the sink.
Zoning decides what fits before design decides what looks good.
Lot coverage, rear and side yard setbacks, building height and parking all come from the City of Ottawa zoning by-law, and they vary street to street. An addition that works on a deep lot in Blackburn Hamlet may not fit at all on a narrow infill lot in Centretown.
We check the zoning for your address early. If your plan needs a minor variance, you find out at the concept stage rather than after paying for a full drawing set.
Parts of downtown Ottawa, including sections of Centretown and Sandy Hill, sit inside heritage conservation districts. Exterior changes there face extra review, and materials matter.
We design with that in mind, keeping window proportions, rooflines and cladding sympathetic to the street rather than fighting the approval process.
Our climate swings roughly sixty degrees between January and July. Design choices either handle that or fail at it.
Large south facing glass looks great in a rendering and cooks a room in August without shading. Deep roof overhangs on the south side, insulated headers, continuous air barriers and a plan for where snow will slide off a new roof all belong in the drawings, not in a site conversation later.
Additions need particular care where the new roof meets the old. Ice damming happens at those transitions, so we detail the flashing, ventilation and insulation at the junction rather than leaving it to be figured out on site.
Design at our shop is not a separate business handing you a PDF. The same company carries the project through as your general contractor.
That closes the usual gap. Framers are not guessing at an ambiguous detail, and the cabinet layout we drew is the one our carpenters install. If your project is mostly interior reconfiguration, our remodeler service takes it from the concept straight into construction.
The most common reason a project stalls is a design that costs double the budget. We price as we design.
If you want that pricing detail on its own, our building consultant service covers cost estimation and planning consultation. Some clients use it to test whether a project is worth pursuing at all before committing to drawings.
Four stages from first visit to a permit ready set.
We measure the existing building and check what the zoning by-law allows on your lot.
Two or three options with a build cost range attached to each, so the decision is informed.
The chosen concept developed into plans, elevations, sections and notes, with engineering where needed.
We submit, answer plans examiner questions, and then build the project we drew.
We design and build throughout the greater Ottawa area. Pick your neighbourhood for local detail.
Most house sized residential projects in Ontario can be designed by a qualified building designer rather than an architect. Larger or unusual buildings may require architectural or engineering seals. We tell you which category your project falls into at the first meeting.
Typically a site plan, floor plans, elevations, cross sections and construction notes, plus engineered details for structural changes. Requirements shift with scope, so we confirm the list for your project before drawing the full set.
Yes, as a range at the concept stage. Because we build as well as draw, we price the concept before you invest in a full permit set. That is where most budget surprises get caught.
Often yes, though setbacks and lot coverage may limit the footprint. On tight lots we look at second storey additions or interior reconfiguration as alternatives, and we check zoning before promising anything.
Concepts usually take one to three weeks. A permit set adds two to five weeks depending on complexity, then the City review period follows. Planning three to four months from first meeting to breaking ground is realistic.
Yes, the drawings are yours once paid for. Most clients keep us through construction because we already know the intent behind every detail, but there is no obligation to.
Book a consultation and we will look at the space, check what your lot allows, and give you a realistic build cost with the concept.
Design and build across the greater Ottawa area since 1999
Book a free consultation. We walk the space with you, talk through what the work involves, and follow up with an itemized estimate.