The Assessment, Manhattan, in person
Owners have been asking us to come look for years. Now you can book it.
The overall plan for the residence, and what it costs. The assessment is credited in full against the Record.
Request the AssessmentWhy the numbers are real
The costs are what this work has actually cost us.
Hundreds of design, furniture, and renovation projects across the tri-state region. Sourcing in furnishings, millwork, and capital improvements. A design and build practice, and two Brooklyn workshops making millwork, custom wood, upholstery, and drapery. So the figures in your Assessment are not drawn from a catalog. They are what this work has cost on projects we ran, in buildings like yours.
What happens without the overall plan
Once a wall closes, changing the bathroom hardware means opening it again.
The lighting gets set before anyone knows where the art goes. The flooring goes down before the furniture is chosen, and then constrains every piece that follows. The millwork is built to a plan the drapery was never shown. Each decision is defensible on its own. Together they cost a year and a second budget.
Intending to do the design work eventually is not a plan, and it is the most expensive position to be in.
What you get
The overall plan, written down.
- What this residence can become, room by room, and what it would take to get there.
- What the work runs across paint, lighting, millwork, flooring, drapery, and finishes, as ranges with the assumptions stated.
- What is on the public record for the building, what buildings like it typically permit, and the questions to put to the board in writing.
- What is already excellent and should be left alone.
- The order it has to happen in, and what gets paid for twice if taken out of order.
- Delivered one week from the visit, with a call to walk it.
Who this is for
Someone who is going to do this once and wants it done right.
Residential design of this kind gets built in layers, and the layers have an order. It is the same visit whether you are deciding on a purchase, living somewhere that has never quite worked, or about to list. A residence planned as a whole is also the one that sells as a whole. We have handed over places where the buyer wanted everything in them, because everything in them was chosen for that residence.
The Assessment and the Record
The Assessment tells you what the residence needs and what it costs. The Record tells you what to put in it: the whole residence designed, up to eight rooms, with pieces named and the reason each one belongs. The full assessment engagement comes off it.
Is this a bid or an estimate I can hold you to?
No. The figures are ranges with the assumptions stated, drawn from what this work has cost on comparable projects. A firm quote comes from whoever does the work, when there is a project and a date.
Can you tell me what my board will approve?
What is on the public record is cited. What is pattern in buildings like yours is labelled as pattern. What only your building can answer is written as a question to put to them in writing. Nothing here is a legal opinion or a representation of what any board will decide.
Do I have to own the property?
No, and the visit is often most useful before you do. We can meet you and a broker at the residence during the contract period, or earlier if you are still deciding.
Do you do the work?
Not as part of this. We run a separate design and build practice, entered only if you ask for it, and nothing said in the visit changes based on whether you do.
I have a broker. Does this get in the way?
No. A broker is paid on the transaction and does not do design feasibility. We are happy to coordinate access directly with them.
Request the Assessment.
We are in touch within two business days to confirm a time, and we can work around a broker’s calendar or a contract deadline. The invoice follows once the visit is set. If it is easier to talk first, call 212-920-7026.
Know the whole plan first.
One visit, and you will know what this residence needs, what it costs, and what has to happen before anything else does.
Request the Assessment