I already have a project. Can you build it?

Yes. But this question actually contains two very different questions, and the answer to each is not the same. Let me split them.

The first: can we build a SIP house from a project that was designed for concrete? Technically, legally, and procedurally — yes. Cleanly, one to one.

The second: should we simply take a finished project from your architect and start building it as it is? That answer is more complicated, and across all the projects we have delivered, it has not happened once. Here is why.

Part one: turning a concrete project into a SIP house

If you already hold a permit for a concrete, masonry or steel building, you do not have to start the permitting process again. This is one of the most valuable things we can tell a client, so it is worth explaining properly.

We are a certified building partner using a construction method that is fully approved across Europe and accepted in Portugal. That means we can issue a technical statement declaring that the house we are going to build — while not concrete — is an approved alternative that meets every parameter your permitted project was approved on: structure, safety, static load, thermal performance, acoustic performance, fire resistance, energy efficiency, and the rest. The Câmara accepts it because we are using a European-certified system as an equivalent to what was already approved. It runs as a shortened procedure, not a new permit.

To get there, we do the work properly. We run a full structural analysis, assess the project statically against the parameters it was permitted on, produce the complete bill of materials and the supporting study. It is a real engineering process — but it is a well-trodden one, and it is not a problem to deliver.

So on the first question: yes, we can take your permitted design and build it as a SIP house through a shortened procedure. That part is straightforward.

Part two: why “just build it” almost never happens

The second part is where it gets serious, and I would rather tell you what is true than what is comfortable.

In our history on Madeira we have worked with a large number of architects and engineers — enough to know exactly which ones add real value to a project and which ones do not. And here is the uncomfortable pattern: getting a project through approval is a demanding process, and some designs are built to do only that — to pass. But passing the approval process is not the same as being a good building.

A project should satisfy far more than the legal and regulatory requirements of the building code. It should satisfy the client’s actual needs, the client’s actual budget, and above all it should be a building that lasts and is detailed properly. Too often, the projects that arrive on our desk were never checked against any of that.

This is why every “finished” project a client brings us has to be reviewed deeply — and why we frequently propose technical changes. When we analyse them, the results often come back unfavourable, either structurally or on cost.

The most common story

It almost always goes the same way. The client found a design they loved. An architect drew something beautiful and placed it elegantly on the plot. But nobody sat down with the client first and asked the real questions.

Before we design anything, we try to understand the client completely. Is this your main home, or a second home? An investment property for rental? Somewhere to retire? Something to build and sell? What are your plans, the materials you love, your tolerance for sun, your climate needs? We work through a large set of questions first, because until we understand what you actually want, we cannot know whether a design serves it.

Most architects, unfortunately, do not do this — even though we strongly believe they should. And so, when we take a project over, we almost always either significantly change it or start again from zero.

Tony Stark architecture

Here is where many clients meet us. They have already approached several builders. Every quote came back far above their budget. After two years of searching, disappointed, they start looking for a cheaper alternative — and they arrive at our door assuming we are the company that makes catalogue prefabs at half the price.

Then they learn two things. First, our system is genuinely more efficient — but because we put a very detailed waterproofing strategy into every build and engineer the details that make a house actually work and stay dry, we are not the cheapest thing on the market either. We talked about that in the previous article, on fair cost comparison. Second — and this is the important one — the reason their quotes were impossible was never the builders. It was the design.

We call it Tony Stark architecture. Visually stunning, beautifully rendered, and enormously expensive to actually build. The beautiful study has to be cut down to what the client can genuinely afford — and that is not a failure of the build system, it is a failure of designing without cost in the room.

So we often persuade the client to put that lovely project in a drawer as a good idea, sit down with us, and go through in real detail what they actually expect from the house. Then we design a building that covers all of it, looks excellent, and fits the budget — because this time, the budget was in the room from the first line.

Why we don’t just send it back to the architect for changes

You might ask: why not just take it back to the original architect and request the changes?

We have tried. It rarely ends well, and the reason is human, not technical. Asking an architect to revise a design means asking them to accept that what they produced was either not buildable or only buildable at a cost the client cannot carry. Most people, understandably, move into a defensive position rather than reopening the work. Instead of a clean revision, you get friction — and the project stalls in the middle.

This is not a criticism of any individual. It is a structural problem: architecture created in isolation from engineering and cost will almost always collide with reality later. Architects are, and should be, highly creative — they invent genuinely interesting solutions. But then engineers have to bring those solutions into the real world, where strength, elasticity, structure and cost are all calculated, hard, and unforgiving. That collision is designed into the process from the start.

That is exactly why we work the way we do — with excellent architects, kept in constant coordination with our engineers, with us breathing down their necks from the first drawing. Not because we distrust architects, but because the only way to avoid the collision is to never let design and cost drift apart in the first place.

So — can you build my project?

Yes. If it is permitted in concrete, we can convert it to a SIP house through a shortened procedure, cleanly.

But if you are hoping we will take a finished design and build the identical thing for meaningfully less than everyone else quoted, I have to be straight with you: that is usually not possible, and the reason confirms exactly what the previous article said. The largest mistake in the cost of a building is made at the design stage. If the design was made without budget, without engineering, and without really understanding you, then the cheapest honest thing we can do is not build it faster — it is help you get the design right.

When we start again, we respect the terrain, we minimise concrete and expensive materials, and we build wherever possible from materials that are natural, long-lasting and available. Not to make it cheaper for its own sake — but so that the house you end up with is one you can actually afford, actually enjoy, and never have to apologise for in five years.

Filip Gajdoš
Founder, Go2Madeira — SIP construction on Madeira