So she returned to Thailand and found an architect in Burinam and here's the final design
Below is a 3D view however its not actually from the final design but an earlier version. The store room in the corner of the kitchen has been removed and the rear verandah roof (blue) extended in the final design to cover what willbe a l;aundry area.
In the initial design the storeroom in the kitchen was a bathroom/dunny and the bathroom between the bedrooms a study. I insisted with the missus that it wouldn't be a good idea to be cooking or eating if someone had just dropped an aromatic dump. So it was then converted to a walk-in pantry, but then it was decided to just leave it all open. She will have benches and cupboards in and around the corner, also a mobile workbench. The windows will be bi-fold, probably wood, although I would prefer some glass ones with a built in flyscreen which I have seen on an aussie website. The door out onto the verandah will, I believe, be a large sliding door which should allow us to almost open up and connect the outside to the inside, in a way that will mean we don't have to build an outside kitchen sometime in the future ( I won't hold my breath though).
Anyway as she says "it will be what it is and you will be happy with it or you can *#** off". Now I know why I love her sooo much.
Below is just one page of the twenty which made up the engineering design. Obviously it was just a case of input some parameters ie width, height, length and the program spits out the size of the beams required with the steel reinforcment required etc.
So now we have the land, the shed, the design so all we need is a builder shouldn't be a problem in Thailand, as everyone's anything you happen to want at the time want it. Of course that doesn't mean they will be able to deliver what you want, so the search started.
One of the benefits of getting the design done by the architect, was that they also have a building company and therefore they wanted to be allowed to quote for the job. When they gave us their quote, it was broken down in a lot of detail which allowed the missus to identify their estimation for material and labour for each bit. Although in the end they didn't get the job, the detail they supplied was invaluable in allowing her to understand the progressive stages of the build. I should say at this point that the cost for their design work was 55,000 baht and she was very happy with their attitude to making amendments, the whole thing took about 3 months.
Finding a builder. In all she spoke with 5 builders and quotes were between 2.65 and 3.6 million baht, she also visited sites where they were working or had built previously. 2 were at the low end and the other 3 were at the high end (she felt the work of each builder to be up to her required standard) so she didn't consider the high end offers any further. Of the other 2, we asked each about a labour only contract, one was willing one wasn't. As a basis for comparison she used the information from the architect's quote to compare his labour only quote and it was OK. The second builder also owned a building supply shop, so that's why he didn't want labour only as it may mean he loses being the supplier. In the end she needed to go for one and she chose the all-inclusive quote mainly because she felt the guy was or would be easier to negotiate with should problems arise. The one thing I do know about my missus is that she is a very good judge of character (except in my case as I managed to fool her, or was it the other way around?).
So now we have a builder. What next? A contract is needed. Although she was told by several people that she didn't need a contract she reckoned she would feel better having one. So after discussions with the builder and lawyer a contract was signed which gives payments based on when a certain stage has been reached/completed.
So now she's ready to start building so its off to the consult the monks about a start date.
to be continued....