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Case study: AK Architecture Ltd

What an AI Blueprint found at an architecture practice.

AK Architecture draws residential extensions, planning applications and building regulations plans. The founder handled every client conversation himself. The blueprint found 15 to 20 hours a week he could get back.

a day on client email
4 to 5 hrsa day on client email
to write each quote
40 minsto write each quote
a week found
15 to 20 hrsa week found
to build all four pieces
6 to 7 wksto build all four pieces

The practice

One person doing two jobs.

Like a lot of small practices, AK Architecture runs on one person's time. The team draws. The founder does everything client facing: the site visits, every quote, every email and every phone call asking where a project has got to. Before the blueprint, he had never used an AI tool.

We spent the blueprint mapping how a job actually moves through the practice, from first enquiry to approval, and timing each step with him.

AI Opportunities Report, AK Architecture Ltd
AI Opportunities Report, AK Architecture Ltd. From a real blueprint for AK Architecture Ltd.

What we found

The drawing was quick. Everything around it was slow.

01

Email took half the day.

Four to five hours a day on client email, at 20 to 25 minutes a message. Amendments were the worst: a drawing change might take five minutes, and the email explaining what it means for the client takes another fifteen to twenty.

02

Every quote was written from scratch.

Around 40 minutes a quote, much of it spent looking up planning, building control and build over fees. The quotes win work because they are specific to each job, so a generic template was never the answer. And when quotes are rushed, small slips such as a missing VAT line come out of the practice's own pocket.

03

Job tracking lived on a whiteboard.

A board in the office, a spreadsheet that fell behind and the founder's memory. When a client asked where their project had got to, finding out meant stopping whatever else was happening.

04

Slow turnaround was costing work.

Jobs were taking four to five weeks to turn round, and the practice was winning fewer of its quotes than it did when turnaround was faster.

What we recommended

Four pieces, in the order that pays back first.

Each piece makes the next one easier, so the order matters as much as the list.

  1. 1A CRM as the foundationOne pipeline for every job, from first enquiry to approval, visible from a phone on site, with every email filed against the right client automatically. Everything else is built on top of it.
  2. 2An AI quote generatorThe founder talks through the site visit in a voice note. AI turns it into a quote in his format, specific to the job, with current fees filled in and VAT always calculated. He checks it and sends it. Estimated: 40 minutes a quote down to 10 to 15.
  3. 3An email assistant that writes like himAI sorts incoming email by type and drafts each reply in his voice, trained on his past emails. Nothing sends without him. Estimated: four to five hours a day down to one to two.
  4. 4A pipeline that updates itselfWhen a client says go ahead, drawings go out or an approval letter arrives, the job moves stage on its own. The whiteboard is no longer needed.
One opportunity in detail, site note to finished quote
One opportunity in detail, site note to finished quote. From a real blueprint for AK Architecture Ltd.
Solution design, how the AI agents fit together
Solution design, how the AI agents fit together. From a real blueprint for AK Architecture Ltd.

The numbers

15 to 20 hours a week.

That is the blueprint's estimate of the time the four pieces would give back, with a roadmap to build them in three stages over six to seven weeks. The practice kept the blueprint, the roadmap and the costings.

These are estimates worked out from the founder's own figures, not results from a finished build. We would rather say so.

Implementation roadmap, an 8 week phased plan
Implementation roadmap, an 8 week phased plan. From a real blueprint for AK Architecture Ltd.

If you run a practice too

The pattern is common.

In small architecture firms the design work is rarely the bottleneck. The explaining, the quoting and the tracking around it are. AI is not touching the drawings in this blueprint. It takes the writing, the fee lookups and the job tracking, so the architect's time goes on the work clients pay for.

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Questions

What architects ask us.

Mostly on the writing and admin around the design work: drafting client emails, building quotes and fee proposals, turning site visit notes into documents and keeping job tracking up to date. That is where this blueprint found the hours.

Not in this blueprint. None of the four pieces touches the drawings. They take the email, the quoting and the tracking around the design, so more of the architect's time goes on the work clients pay for.

AK Architecture is a small team and the blueprint still found 15 to 20 hours a week, because nearly all the client work sat with one person. The smaller the team, the more each of those hours matters.

No. They are the blueprint's estimates, worked out from the founder's own figures. We would rather say that plainly than dress an estimate up as a result.

Nothing. The AI Blueprint is free and you keep it whether or not you build anything with us.

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