Builders and project management in Devon

Across Devon it is mostly cob and stone renovation, oak framing, barn conversion and bespoke new builds, all of it fully project managed on a fee agreed before anything starts. Across Devon the constraint is rarely the town and almost always the parish: conservation areas covering whole village cores, listed farm groups where the barns are curtilage listed as well as the house, and open countryside policy that decides whether a plot is a plot at all. Every project begins with a look at the building and the site rather than a price guessed over the phone.

Yes. Devon brings a lot of cob and thatch, which is a genuinely different material conversation to the stone further east. Ring and we will tell you what we usually find in buildings around Exe valley and what yours is likely to need before anything is opened up.

It does, considerably. Devon is stone, cob, brick and timber frame depending on which valley you are in, and the material decides the repair. A wall built without a cavity and without a damp proof course has to breathe, so it wants lime rather than cement and a breathable paint rather than masonry sealer. Farm buildings bring their own question, because barns and outbuildings within the curtilage of a listed house are usually listed too, whatever anybody has been told. The first visit is spent working out what the building actually is before anything is proposed for it.

Across Devon the constraint is rarely the town and almost always the parish: conservation areas covering whole village cores, listed farm groups where the barns are curtilage listed as well as the house, and open countryside policy that decides whether a plot is a plot at all. Whether your particular building needs consent depends on what it is, whether it is listed, and whether it sits in a conservation area or a National Landscape, and all three get checked at the first visit rather than assumed. Where consent is needed, the application, the heritage justification and the conservation officer conversation are handled as part of the job.

No. Devon is inside the area we cover, so travel is in the fixed fee rather than added to it. The fee is agreed at the outset and does not climb with the value of the build, which is the whole point of doing it that way.

Getting out to look at a building in Devon and talk it through is usually a matter of days. Starting on site is a different question, because a project of any size needs design, consent and trades booked in the right order, and that is measured in months rather than weeks. We would far rather give you a real date than a hopeful one, so ring and we will tell you honestly where the next slot is.

A network of masons, carpenters, framers, lime plasterers, roofers, leadworkers, electricians and plumbers built up across the South West over more than thirty five years, engaged directly at trade prices rather than bought through a main contractor. On heritage work in Devon that network is most of the value, because the specialists who can do it properly are not people you find at short notice.