CONTRACTOR AND CLIENT

Evening Star, Issue 19660, 13 September 1927, Page 2

CONTRACTOR AND CLIENT

EL!6S!HAT!HG UNPLEASANTNESS More unpleasantness in building arises from two causes—distrust of the architect and builder and constant interference with workmen—than from all other causes combined, and no building can be done happily where these things exist (writes W.H.W., in the Christchurch ‘Press’). There are clients who go to the job constantly and bring happiness with them, not only to tho architect and the builder, but to the individual mechanics; they are interested in the work- that pleases us; they believe in us—that Hatters us, and wo all of ns work to give them the kind of house they want; changes arc mad l ' promptly, cheaply, ynd with a feeling that they are for the best. Then there is another type of client who neve'puts his foot on the job without nagging or fault-finding, or complaining that he “was never informed of this,” or ho “did not understand that thk was to be that way.” In the end wc grow to hate the sight of him. We do what he wants not because it is best for the job, but to still his querulous voice, and he naturally has to pay for every change ho makes. We have no pleasure in the work, and he has none either, unless he is one of those happily rare individuals who take pleasure in making oilier people unhappy; and nine times out of ten his changes will have hurt rather than helped ■ his house.

The client flic builder likes best s the owner who understands his plans, reads his .specifications, insists on being made acquainted with his details, knows what the builder has agreed to furnish him, and insists on it, but docs not insist on the builder doing .something ho has not agreed to do or that is foblisli in itself. Above all. we fear the man who accepts every pieces of advice given by casual acquaintances who have just built themselves a house, and, of course, as a result set up as “knowing it all.” If your architect is worth, hiring, his advice is worth knowing; if you select your builder because he knows his business, do not assume he is trying lo “do” you because his methods differ from those of some other builder you know of. Meet your builder with confidence and good temper, and he will respond with an especial effort to give you not only the value of your money, 'but a little more for kindness—you can capitalise courtesy, and you will enjoy doing it. Finally, building a house may be one of the pleasantest things in the world, or it may bo sheer misery, depending first on the temperament of the house-builder, and, second, upon the competence of . the architect and contractor, who are jointly responsible for the carrying cut of the owner’s ideas of what a house is.

To get tho most pleasure out of building and to achieve the best results, a certain amount of knowledge of the methods of building is necessary, not perhaps of the actual mechanical processes of the carpenter or plumber, but of what the relationship is between the owner and the people employed to do the work. To an architect or builder it is always a new surprise when he finds that a man, contemplating an enterprise which involves a very considerable sum of money, knows so little haw to disburse it wisely, and it certainly redounds to tho credit of those engaged in an industry involving such huge outlay that very rarely has the ‘building public any •serious cause of complaint against those v/ho are given the job of spending these sums. Building of any kind should be a source of .infinite pleasure to all concerned-in it; it is in a limited way an act of creation of .something not only useful, but often beautiful, and when the structure is a home it is a thing which should be more than an inanimate object, a mere shelter from wind and weather; it should possess a personality fitting to its owner and of infinite and continuing delight to him.