I am starting a project and I have my own architect. Can you meet them?

Before we get to the architect, one of the most useful things we bring to a project is a solar study for building in Madeira — but let us start with the question itself.

Yes. We have no problem meeting your architect, sitting down together, and answering technical questions about our system. That part is genuinely straightforward, and we are glad to do it.

But this question usually contains a second, unspoken one — and it is worth bringing into the open, because it decides how the whole collaboration works.

What we give freely, and what is a paid service

There is a difference between a meeting and a mandate.

Meeting your architect and answering a set of technical questions about how we build — that is free, and we are happy to do it. More than that: we have a full package of documentation we can hand to your architect so they can study our technical system properly. Panel specifications, wall build-ups, the technical details of the construction method — all the material they need to design a complete project around our system. That is not a problem, and it comes at no cost.

Where it changes is here. If what you actually want is for us — as the building company — to watch over the project, to check every detail, to catch the architect before they design something that turns out to be too expensive to build, then that is a different thing entirely. That is engineering supervision. It is real work, done by engineers, and engineering work has never been free anywhere in the world.

So we are clear about it from the start: answering questions is one thing. Taking responsibility for controlling the budget and the technical integrity of someone else’s design is another. We do it gladly — but as a paid engagement, with the time and the added value we put into the project reflected in a proper quote. We will not carry the responsibility of catching another professional’s mistakes without being engaged, and paid, to do exactly that.

This is not us being difficult. It is the honest line between goodwill and the work that actually protects your budget.

What our engineers can bring to your architect’s design and What a solar study for building in Madeira shows?

When we are engaged properly, this is where the real value shows — and it is worth understanding, because most of it is information your architect simply does not have access to on their own.

A full solar and orientation study. We analyse your plot digitally and determine exactly where the sun sits at every point of the year — where it rises, where it sets, from which angle, in which season, and precisely where on the horizon the sun disappears at sunset. From that we can map the plot into zones — which part of the land is best, which is only mild, which is genuinely poor — for placing the building. We can define the building height needed to clear a neighbour’s roofline and keep the ocean view unobstructed, calculated for the sightline of a person both standing and seated. Done at the very start, this lets the architect position the house to capture light and solar heat gain exactly when you want them, protect the best views, and hold onto the sunset for the longest possible part of the year. You can see a real example of one of these studies at the end of this article.

A full climate and seasonal analysis. This goes a step beyond the sun. We assess the site across all four seasons from four angles — wind, cold, sun, and shade — and translate it into concrete architectural guidance. Prevailing wind directions and how they change through the year. How many hours the outdoor space is genuinely comfortable, and what interventions (wind breaks, shading, lighting) would extend that. When it makes sense to open the house up and bring the outside in, and when the priority is shelter instead. For a location like ours, the analysis often shows something that shapes the whole design: almost no heating needed across the entire year, with cooling relevant only in the peak of summer. That single fact points directly at the right strategy — an airtight, well-insulated envelope with intelligent shading, rather than a house fighting a heating problem it does not have.

This is not decoration. It is the difference between a terrace you actually use and one that sits empty because it is always in the wind, or a living room that overheats every afternoon because nobody checked where the summer sun lands.

Wall thicknesses and build-ups, early. We can tell your architect in advance what the wall thicknesses and wall build-ups will be, so they can use the footprint better. Our walls, at the same thermal and technical performance, are significantly thinner than masonry — which means that within the same outer envelope, the same external footprint, you get more usable interior space. An architect who knows that from the first drawing designs a better, more efficient plan.

Buildability advice. We can consult on how complex a design will be to actually build, and advise both the architect and the client accordingly. This is one of the most useful things we do early, because we frequently see designs that are beautiful but very difficult to realise. On the mainland that is not much of a problem. On Madeira it is — the island has a limited pool of specialised trades and materials, which means a complicated detail can force the import of materials and the use of external companies for the installation, and both push the cost up sharply.

The usual culprits are the details: windows, roofs, certain lintels, very nice design features, sheet-metal façades, ventilated façades and similar elements. Each of them can be beautiful and completely justified — but each of them is also a place where a design decision made without knowing the local reality turns into a large, avoidable bill later.

So — can you meet my architect?

Yes, gladly. We will meet them, answer their technical questions, and give them everything they need to understand our system.

And when you want us to do more than that — to bring our engineers into the design, to run the solar and climate study, to keep the budget and the buildability under control from the first line — we are ready to do exactly that, as a proper engagement. That is where the collaboration stops being a favour and starts being the thing that genuinely protects your project.

The best time to bring us in is now, at the very beginning — before the design has committed to decisions that are expensive to undo. Which is, in the end, the same lesson as every other article in this series: the money is saved or lost at the design stage, not at the build.

One more thing, if you read this far

If you made it all the way to the end of this article, you are exactly the kind of client we like working with — someone who wants to understand the process before committing to it. So here is something concrete in return: a real solar and climate study, the kind we prepare for our clients, so you can see the level of detail that goes into a project before the first line is ever drawn.

You can view it here: DOWNLOAD

It is one of the things that separates a house designed around its plot from a house simply dropped onto it.