Discover how to ensure your dream home project meets the Building Regulations, why it’s important to develop the details at the design stage – and the new standards for 2022

WORDS BY JULIAN OWEN & CHRIS BATES

Mostof us don’t get too many shots at creating our dream home. So it’s worth taking time at the early stages to make sure you get it right. With planning in the bag, you’re bound to be feeling excited and more than a little relieved to get past the first hurdle. But don’t put your feet up just yet. Decisions will be coming thick and fast, as you and your architectural team start to develop the technical design and make the key choices that will come to define your finished home.

Ultimately, some kind of building control body will need to approve the structural drawings as compliant with the legal standards set out in the Building Regulations. But bear in mind the regs are intended only to set out the minimum requirements. Admittedly, they’ve recently got a bit more challenging (more on that later). But in general, you’ll probably be looking to go above and beyond the bare necessities required to get the rubber stamp that confirms you can start construction. Most self builders aim to achieve a higher level of performance and finish – and delivering this will involve a lot more than a set of neat structural drawings that simply beat the basic standard.

Taking the technical design forward

Paying your house designer to prepare drawings and specifications that go beyond the minimum requirements of the regs may provide good value for money. This way, you can gain more certainty about the accuracy of quotations and quality of the construction work itself. Just be sure to satisfy yourself that their team can offer the level of technical expertise and structural engineering your project requires. You don’t want to find out part-way through your build that the open-plan layout you planned suddenly requires three times the structural steelwork (and a big uplift in your project budget).

It’s also a very good idea to speak to key suppliers as early as possible (ideally at the planning stage) to get the best, most current information about the products you’re thinking of using. This way, your architectural team can ensure they’re fully integrated into the drawings. Pick suppliers’ brains about the design, too. This can help to simplify structural details and keep your budget on track.

Some self builders choose to forego detailed technical design and instead make decisions on the fly during the works, in the hope of saving money. But don’t be surprised if your builder complains there’s insufficient information for them to achieve what you’re expecting (and that it’s going to cost a little more than they first realised).