How we run it
Northbeam holds the contract and the risk. We pair you with an architect suited to your project type from our 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 drift apart quietly. There is no phase where the design team and the builder blame each other, because they answer to the same signature.
A guaranteed maximum price, early
We commit to a GMP at 50 percent design development on most project types, earlier than most builders will commit, because our estimates run on self-perform cost data and current trade quotes rather than published averages. After GMP, the ledger discipline continues: every buyout gain and contingency draw is reported monthly, and unspent contingency is returned, not absorbed.
Where it earns its keep
Compressed schedules, complicated sites, and owners who want one throat to choke. Fairlane Yards (212 units) and the Bluestem Process Center (148,000 SF) both ran design-build on this fictional portfolio: different markets, same result: single accountability, GMP held, schedule met.
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 construction management or hard-bid GC work instead. A delivery method is a tool, not an ideology.