So you have decided to look for an architect you think you can "feel comfortable working with", have you? Wonderful!   Considering the fact that designing a home and a garden will be an extremely personal experience for you (as well as for your architect – we might add), that is an extremely important consideration, indeed!

     To you, because in addition to telling the architect  what you need, want, and can or cannot afford financially (budget wise), you must be willing to be honest, to open up, to let him in on who you are, what you are like, what motivates and drives you, what you like and dislike, what you do and don't feel comfortable with, what turns you on or off, what your life-style is, what your hobbies are, what your dreams are, what relaxes you, what "happiness" means to you, in short, what makes you tick!

     As a client you have to be prepared to enter into a relationship characterized by a good deal of the type of give-and-take you enjoy with, say, your best friend.  The hallmark of any good architect is his ability to "see" and to propose a myriad of ideas, options, and alternate solutions to design problems most of which you might never have thought of, much less considered, on your own.  Therefore, keeping your mind open constantly to weigh and to explore new creative ideas and concepts is absolutely essential on your part!

     In that same vein, to get  the best of what your architect has to offer in terms of design creativity, you must make him feel free to speak his mind and to challenge you, if need be.  You certainly should NOT expect him constantly to tell you what he thinks you would like to hear.  If he does, you should dissuade him of it.  If he persists, fire him!  After all, you hired him not to play the role of a tape recorder or a sycophant but to help you design and create the best home and the best garden that your money can buy!  At the other extreme, neither should you permit him to take the project over to the extent that the resulting home and garden threaten to become more HIS than yours! 

     Throughout the entire home and garden design process you would do well to always keep in mind that the final quality of any design effort is, in equal measures, as dependent on the design creativity and the technical competence of your architect, as it is on the quality of the working relationship he enjoys with you, his client.  Unproductive relationships seldom, if ever, produce viable, let alone, exceptional results!

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