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Service 02
Design-Build
Design-build means you hire one team and hold it accountable for both the drawings and the building. Done honestly, it is the fastest and least adversarial way to deliver light commercial work.
How we run it
Gantry holds the contract and the risk. We pair you with an architect suited to your project type from our working bench of regional design partners, or we contract with the architect you already trust. Design proceeds against a live budget from day one, so scope and money never get to drift apart quietly. There is no phase where the design team and the builder blame each other, because they answer to the same contract.
Guaranteed maximum price, early
We commit to a GMP at 50 percent design development on most project types. That is earlier than most GCs will commit, and it is possible because our estimate is built on self-perform cost data and current sub quotes rather than published averages. After GMP, the ledger discipline continues: every buyout gain and every contingency draw is reported monthly, and unspent contingency is returned, not absorbed.
Where design-build earns its keep
Three of the six projects in our ledger are design-build: Riverworks Lofts (214,000 square feet, multifamily), Stonebridge Clinic (42,000 square feet, ambulatory surgery), and Summit Flex Park (156,000 square feet, industrial). Different markets, same result: single accountability, GMP held, schedule commitments published and met. All demo figures illustrative.
When we talk you out of it
Design-build is wrong for owners who want to run their own design contract and bid the market wide. If that is your project, we will say so in the first meeting and propose CM at-risk or hard-bid general contracting instead. A delivery method is a tool, not an ideology.
Or call the desk directly: (555) 042-2200
Start a project
Have a project going to bid?
Send the drawings, the napkin sketch, or just the pro forma. You will have a real conversation with our preconstruction team within two business days, and a concept budget within three weeks.