Changing Expectations

15 November 2015 Paul Newman, Self Build Director

Image of Potton architectural designs and elevations

When we launched our very first set of self build designs in 1981 there were only 12 of them.

Back then, life was relatively simple both for us and for our customers; select a design, make a few simple modifications to it and once planning has been obtained - start building.

Fast forward to 2016 and it’s fair to say that life is somewhat more complicated.

We have now designed and constructed over 6,000 self build properties, giving us a significant back catalogue to draw upon and have introduced a variety of different design routes that customers can choose from to interact with us.

More important that any of this though is the belief that we are designing houses for our customers not for ourselves, the knowledge that every design is bespoke but must still work within it’s setting and the facts that what we create must be both buildable and affordable.

Download Our Ideas Books

We have, for many years, published the most popular designs from our portfolio in hard copy. The Ideas Book is invaluable for those of our customers who want something fairly traditional and want tomsehting to lok at to take inspiration from and you can pick up a hard copy book from our Self Build Show Centre in St Neots.

Alternatively, you can download the Ideas Book, alongwith our 'More Design Ideas' Book.

Our in-house architectual team...

Our in-house architectural team have an in-depth knowledge of our building systems and the designs in our portfolio. They understand the limitations of what can and can't sensibly be achieve and are readily available to get the best out of an existing design given any particular starting point.

This approach genuinely suits a lot of customers and for them makes the process of giving us a design brief where they can have real input, much more straightforward than having to start completely from scratch.

We have found through experience that in todays marketplace design is not an area where it is appropriate to have a one size fits all approach.

So, over the past few years we have worked hard to expand our design horizons and develop our ability to provide a completely bespoke service; we have done well at this and probably now find that one of the hardest parts of providing a bespoke service is helping our customers to think critically about what they want from their self build and encouraging them to develop a brief that helps them articulate what they want and gives us something we can design from.

Our resources, abilities and experience in this area continue to develop and I truly believe the days when you could say with authority “that’s a Potton” have pretty much come to an end.

Working alongside our Self Build Consultants our architectural team are always happy to take a design brief and provide a concept for further development.

Meet our architect

Bespoke contemporary Potton self build home

Potton have an in-house architect, Vicky Corbett who recently designed this bold and bespoke Potton home for a family in Peterborough. Read the case study here.

If you'd like to discuss your design ideas with Vicky then you can arrange a meeting with her at our Show Centre in St Neots, Cambridgeshire. Simply call the Show Centre directly to arrange this on 01480 403285.

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Potton Head Office

Eltisley Road

Great Gransden

Sandy

SG19 3AR

441767 676400