Articles
Notes from the job site
What we have learned running renovations, build-outs and furniture installs: costs, schedules, contracts and the details that decide opening day.
Church interior renovations: sanctuary, classrooms and lobbies
A building committee met us in their sanctuary on a rainy Wednesday. The pastor did not start with the room itself. He pointed at the lobby carpet, worn thin s…
Read the article →Dealership showroom renovations and brand image updates
The manufacturer's rep walked the renovated showroom with a binder open to the finish schedule, checking the floor tile against a sample she had approved eight…
Read the article →Gym and fitness studio build-outs: what the space has to carry
The first thing we look at in a proposed gym space is not the finish board. It is the floor. A second-floor retail bay that was framed for clothing racks is no…
Read the article →Car wash lobbies and detail centers: the interiors around the tunnel
The last thing we finish before a car wash reopens isn't the tunnel, it's the pay booth glass and the last coat of paint in the detail bay where a customer wai…
Read the article →Dental office build-outs: the details behind every chair
The first drawing we ask a dentist for is not the floor plan. It is the equipment layout from the dental supply company, the one that shows every chair, every…
Read the article →The punch list: how a job actually gets finished
The punch walk on a hotel floor starts at the elevator lobby with the owner, the designer, a roll of blue tape and the project manager who has been on the job…
Read the article →Working through a Texas summer: heat, crews and the schedule
By two in the afternoon in late July an unconditioned Houston space with the ceilings still open can climb well over a hundred degrees inside, and a framing cr…
Read the article →Six budgeting errors that sink commercial projects (and the fixes)
Halfway through a hotel renovation an owner showed us the spreadsheet he had built eighteen months earlier. The construction number was close. What was missing…
Read the article →Design-build or design-bid-build: choosing how to buy your project
An owner called us last spring with a finished set of drawings, three bids that did not agree with each other, and a lease date that had already been pushed on…
Read the article →Why a change order costs what it does on a commercial job
A change order for a single relocated door came across a desk last spring, and it was not the door that cost money. It was the header already framed, the elect…
Read the article →Senior living renovation costs in Texas: what sets the number
Our superintendent measured a corridor door in an assisted living wing last month and it came back four inches wider than the standard door down the hall in th…
Read the article →What a c-store interior rebrand costs per square foot
We walked a convenience store the week before a rebrand crew gutted the sales floor, and the operator's question was simple: why does a store this size cost mo…
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