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Building Regulations
Building regulations approval is the legal sign off that confirms your design meets UK rules on safety, structure, energy use and access. As a building regulations consultant, we handle Approved Document compliance and Building Safety Act gateways, so your application keeps moving. Our building control consultant team builds in fire safety, structure, access and energy from the start. That way, your sign off and your green goals get sorted together, not one after the other.
Speak to our building regulations approval team
What sets us apart in building regulations approval
We work directly with Local Authorities and Approved Inspectors across the country, and we prepare the drawing packages accordingly. The detail in them is there because a building control officer needs it, not because a template calls for it. We’ve taken schemes through building control approval from the south west to Scotland. Our work spans care, residential, retail and industrial sectors, and that range shapes the advice we give.
Our architecture team sits within a wider consultancy, next to structural, mechanical, electrical and civil specialists. A building regulations plan gets checked against each of these as it grows, not once the drawings are done. We look at build cost from the start too, alongside the rules themselves. A design that pleases an officer on paper still has to work for a site manager on a budget, and that’s where good coordination earns its keep.
The gateway system
How the Building Safety Act changes your approval route
Building control has changed a lot this year. The Building Safety Regulator moved from the Health and Safety Executive to a new body in January 2026. It now sits under the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. If your job counts as a higher risk building under the Building Safety Act, it moves through a gateway system rather than one approval. Gateway one sits at planning. Gateway two comes before work starts on site. Gateway three sits at completion. A weak application at gateway two can hold up the whole job. We put the golden thread together from the start: the change log, the fire evidence, all in place before the pressure builds.
Every project, every scale
Why smaller projects still need the rules followed closely
The rules apply in full whatever the size of the job. A building signed off wrongly can be hard to sell or insure later. A small project carries the same duty to comply, just with less paperwork. Extend a house or fit out one shop unit, and every relevant rule still applies. Older or listed buildings often need the rules read with care rather than to the letter. That takes a consultant who has done it before.
Wrekin Housing Trust & Jessup Brothers, Stanton Road Residential Scheme
Appointed to provide multi-disciplinary services for a £10 million extra care and residential development for Jessup Brothers in Shifnal.
View ProjectOur architectural services are led by chartered architects, RIBA accredited, working across the UK on buildings that need to earn their keep long after opening day. A design only proves itself once it’s built: once a planning officer has signed it off, an engineer has checked it stands and the budget has held. That’s the standard we work to on every project, whatever the sector.
Commercial interior design works when it starts from one question: what does this space need to do? We treat layout, light and material as tools with a job to perform, not decoration added once the plan is set. Our commercial interior design services cover workplace interior design, retail fit-outs and public sector buildings, each one shaped around how the space gets used. As part of a wider multi-disciplinary consultancy, we design with structure, budget and delivery already in the room.
Our master planning services turn a site’s constraints into a plan that can actually be built. A masterplan has to work twice over: once as a design, and again as a case that stands up to a planning committee. Most schemes that stall didn’t lack ambition. They lacked the groundwork underneath it. We build a site masterplan on evidence gathered early, from surveys to policy checks, so it still holds up from first sketch through to the final RIBA stage.
We’re planning consultants, and we know a scheme succeeds or fails on its paperwork as much as its design. We prepare planning applications with that in mind: architects, engineers and specialists working from the same brief, under one roof. From first sketch to final decision, we manage the documents, brief the specialists and deal directly with your council on your behalf, so you don’t have to.
Sustainable architecture design sits at the heart of every building we make at Morson Praxis. We treat low carbon architecture as a core skill, not something added near the end. Buildings cause a quarter of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions, so the decisions made at concept stage carry real weight. Good sustainable building design gets those early decisions right, from the first sketch through to handover.
A drawing shows you where the walls go. Architectural visualisation shows you what it will feel like to walk through the door. We build photorealistic CGIs, animations and walkthroughs that turn technical drawings into something anyone can follow. Clients, planners and communities get to see a scheme long before a brick is laid, which means fewer surprises and more confidence at every stage that follows.
Understanding building regulations approval
A few of the questions we’re asked most about building regulations approval and how our building control consultant team can help.
Building regulations approval is the formal sign off that confirms a building’s design and build meet UK legal standards for safety, structure, energy use and access. It is separate from planning permission. Most building work in England and Wales needs both before it can start, or be signed off as complete.
A building regulations consultant is a specialist who draws up plans, works with Local Authorities and Approved Inspectors, and handles the detail a project needs to pass building control. They turn the rules into designs that work, which cuts the risk of delay or a rejected application.
Building control and planning permission are two separate approvals. Planning looks at land use and how a building looks, whereas building control checks it’s safe, sound, energy efficient and accessible. Most projects need both, and building regulations approval usually follows once planning permission is granted.
A building control consultant is worth having on a project of any size, since the rules apply in full no matter the scale. Mistakes on smaller jobs, such as a home extension, can still be costly to put right, and may affect a sale or insurance later.
Building regulations approval timescales depend on the project and the local authority’s workload. A full plans application is usually decided within five weeks, or two months if you agree to extend it. Higher risk buildings under the Building Safety Act follow a longer process, with its own set timeframes.
