Cornerstone — The Concept.
The Concept Vol. I
Folio 001 — Opening

Before
you meet
the architect,
meet your home.

A considered architectural study, prepared specifically for your project and delivered to your inbox within twenty-four hours. Three directions. A budget framework. The vocabulary you need for every meeting that follows.

From $19 · 24-hour delivery
A residence in study
Plate 01 A residence, in study.
Folio 002 On the purpose of this study

Every home worth building begins with a question, not a drawing. What is this place for? Who lives here, and how? What should it feel like to come home? The architect will eventually answer these questions in line and section. But the work of asking them — clearly, honestly, before any meter is run — is yours.

We exist to help with that work. Not to design your home. Not to replace the architect. To prepare you, so that when you do meet one, the conversation begins from a position of clarity rather than confusion.

Folio 003 — The deliverable

What you
receive.

A document worth bringing to the table. Considered, specific to your family, and prepared with the same rigour that large practices reserve for institutional clients. Four parts, one document, in your inbox by tomorrow.

Three concepts
Plate 02
i.

Three architectural concepts.

Not variations on one idea. Three genuinely different directions — each developed in response to your site, your family, and the way you live. Each concept is given its own character, its own logic, its own set of trade-offs.

ii.

A lifestyle-matched brief.

Your family's daily rhythm — children's ages, work-from-home hours, hosting habits, the long-held hope you cannot quite articulate — translated into specific spatial requirements. The questions a thoughtful architect would ask, answered before the first meeting.

Lifestyle
Plate 03
Budget
Plate 04
iii.

A budget framework.

A realistic distribution of your budget across structure, envelope, interiors, and systems — calibrated to your region and the specification level appropriate to your concept. Not a quote. A frame, so that when quotes arrive, you can read them.

iv.

The architect-meeting brief.

A formatted PDF — the complete study, prepared to share. Articulates your vision. Saves consultation time. Demonstrates that you have thought it through. The kind of document that changes the tone of the first meeting before a word is spoken.

Brief
Plate 05
A residence in landscape
Plate 06 — A study in landscape

"The home should answer the land before it answers the family."

Plate 06
Folio 005

On position

We do not design your home. We do not draft plans. We do not replace the architect.

We help you arrive at design — knowing what you want, knowing what your family needs, knowing what to watch for in every meeting that follows.

The drawings come later, from someone licensed to make them. The thinking, the questions, the brief that makes the drawings possible — that begins here.

Cornerstone Studio
The editorial
Folio 006 — The intake

What we ask
before we begin.

The quality of your study depends almost entirely on what you tell us. The intake is unhurried — thirty questions that translate your life into a brief an architect would respect. A sample of what you will be asked appears at right.

Q.01
How does the morning begin in your home — quietly, or all at once?
Q.07
How many hours a week is the home a workplace, and for whom?
Q.12
When you imagine the home in ten years, who lives there — and who has left?
Q.18
Where in your current home do you find yourself, when you want to be alone?
Q.24
If guests visit, do they stay for an hour, an evening, or a weekend?
Q.30
What worries you most about this project — beyond the budget?
Folio 007 — The studies

Three depths.
One method.

Three studies, each appropriate to a different stage of your thinking. Begin where you are — most clients begin with The Concept.

The Brief.
When the direction isn't yet clear.
$19
Most chosen
The Concept.
Three directions, compared with rigour.
$49
The Blueprint.
Concept, plus the meeting handbook.
$129
Architectural concepts
One direction
Three compared
Three, plus appendix
Mood imagery
3 plates
12 plates
12 plates
Lifestyle-to-space mapping
Brief
Full
Full
Budget framework
Notes
Per direction
Per direction + regional benchmarks
A day in this home — narrative
—
Per concept
Per concept
Three things you may regret
—
Per concept
Per concept
Architect-meeting handbook
—
—
Included
50 red flags · architects & builders
—
—
Included
14 contract clauses to negotiate
—
—
With wording
Regulatory review
—
—
Included
30-day revision
—
—
1 round
Length of PDF
12 pages
24 pages
48 pages + appendix
Delivery
24 hours
24 hours
24 hours
Folio 008 — Three promises

What we
promise.

I.

Delivered in twenty-four hours.

If your study is not in your inbox within twenty-four hours of payment, you receive a full refund — and the study, when it is ready, at no charge.

II.

Every study reviewed by a person.

No fully-automated deliveries. A person reads what is sent to you before it is sent. Errors are corrected. Generic language is removed.

III.

Full refund within seven days.

If the study fails to be useful, write to us within seven days. We refund the full amount. No questions, no friction.

— Cornerstone —

Begin with
the concept.

Your home deserves deliberate thinking, before any line is drawn.