Architect just pulled out of construction phase

thos

Hi all,
I'm on the verge on signing contracts with builder and submitting commencement notice for our house build, but our architect has pulled out due to other commitments.

The architect has been brilliant up until this point, so we are massively disappointed. His advice now is to use the engineer (who has been involved in the project) for site supervision and required sign offs.

Obviously, we would prefer to retain an architect for the construction, but I'm struggling to see the value in someone who has not been involved in the project so far coming in at such a late stage, and either finger pointing or looking to make changes.

We will be taking the weekend to think it over, but I'm interested in feedback from anyone who has used an engineer in this circumstance or changed architects at late stage.

Thanks,
Tom

rampantbunny

I was in a similar situation myself.

It's not clear from your post if the engineer has or has not been involved in the project up to now. I imagine they have to have been consulted for structural reasons, so should be familiar with your plans.

If you personally appointed the engineer, I don't see that you'd have an issue.

If you didn't appoint the engineer (maybe your architect did), then I'd strongly recommend having a sit down before moving forward. I've learned that communication is paramount - you need to know that the engineer is on your wavelength.
Second most important factor (for me at least) is time-keeping, or as I like to call it 'just being professional'. Hard to guage this one from a sit down but it's important that there's some kind of SLA you can rely on.

Regardless of who appointed whom, I'd ask the architect to do a proper hand-over (documented by your architect) directly to the engineer. Don't get in the middle.

I didn't appoint my engineer, I didn't practice what I've preached above. I hope someone else can learn from my mistakes.
Best of luck.

thos

Food for thought, thanks.