Scope, Design & Drawings

Scope is decided three times

On every renovation, scope gets locked in three places. First in the kitchen conversation between you and your partner. Then on the drawings the designer or architect produces. Then on the site, the day a wall comes down and the existing condition behind it is different than expected. The only way to keep all three aligned is to put serious effort into the second one — the drawings — before anyone swings a hammer.

Designer, architect, or builder-led drawings?

The choice depends on scope. A kitchen-and-bath renovation with no structural moves can usually be done from a designer's drawings and the builder's shop drawings. A full main-floor renovation with structural reframing benefits from a registered architect or a strong design-build builder who carries that capacity in-house. The Architectural Institute of British Columbia regulates the title "architect" in BC; anyone calling themselves a designer is not equivalent and may or may not have the structural literacy your project needs.

Our deeper take on this is in Architect vs. builder drawings — the version that explains what each set actually does and doesn't include.

What "permit-ready" actually means

Greater Vancouver municipalities each have a different definition of a complete permit submission, but the principle is consistent: drawings must be detailed enough that a plan-checker can confirm code compliance without asking you questions. Burnaby's Building Permits page lists what they expect for a residential renovation, and the BC Building Code itself — the Province's central code portal — is the authoritative reference for technical requirements.

A permit-ready set typically includes existing-condition drawings, proposed drawings, structural details and engineer's stamp where required, mechanical and electrical layouts, and an energy compliance path. Skipping any one of these is what produces the four-month "design coordination" delay people complain about — it's not the city being slow, it's the set being incomplete.

Common scope mistakes we see

• Drawing only what's changing. The plan-checker needs the existing layout to understand the impact of the new layout. Half-drawings stall.
• "We'll figure it out on site." Every decision deferred to site is a change order waiting. Decisions cost roughly an order of magnitude more in the field than they do on paper.
• No structural review on a load-bearing wall move. An engineer's letter is non-negotiable; finding out mid-demo is the worst time.
• Energy compliance treated as paperwork. If you trigger envelope upgrades, the energy path drives material and assembly choices — not a checkbox at the end.

The pre-construction services agreement

For mid-to-large renovations we use a pre-construction services agreement — a paid, fixed-scope engagement covering feasibility, drawing review, cost realism, and sequencing. It's the work that protects everyone before a fixed-price construction contract makes sense. The full reasoning is in our piece on pre-construction services.

Earlier-stage homeowners often find our planning checklist useful — most items apply equally to renovation projects.