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How we build

Forty sites a year. We buy three.

  1. Three people standing on a cleared plot marked with survey stakes, one pointing across the ground while the others hold an unrolled site plan and a tablet

    Find the site

    We look at roughly forty sites a year and buy three. We walk each one at different hours, talk to the neighbours, and pull the zoning and drainage history before we make an offer. Most of what we learn is a reason not to proceed.

    Outcome: A site we understand, or a pass.

  2. Three people around a studio table spread with floor plans and stone and tile samples, a large white model of the scheme on a table in the foreground

    Design for the block

    The building answers to its street first. We start with how it meets the sidewalk, where the light falls, and what it does to the house next door — then we work inward to the floor plans.

    Outcome: Drawings that fit the block, not just the lot.

  3. Four people at a meeting-room table with rolled drawings and paperwork in front of them, a colour-coded site plan on the screen behind

    Entitle and permit

    Zoning, variances, neighbourhood review. This is the slowest stage and the one most developers rush. We budget a year and are occasionally wrong about that.

    Outcome: Approvals in hand, with no promises we cannot keep.

  4. A four-storey building under construction with its frame still exposed, a tower crane lifting a steel beam and workers in high-visibility vests on the deck and at the kerb

    Build

    Same superintendent from foundation to final. We self-perform framing and manage every other trade directly, because the alternative is finding out about a problem after it is covered up.

    Outcome: A building we would put our own name on the mailbox of.

  5. A woman handing keys to a couple on the forecourt of a finished apartment building, with moving boxes stacked by the entrance and residents on the path behind

    Deliver and stand behind it

    Walkthrough, punch list, and a two-year structural warranty we have actually honoured. The team that built it takes the call.

    Outcome: Keys, and a number that still works in year three.

Bring us a site

If you have a site in mind, we will walk it with you before anyone talks numbers.

Contact us