It was a nightmare trying to work with [Strang] architects. We were mislead and convinced that Max Strang would be able to design a classical modern symmetrical 8,000 square ft home for our family and that it would also comply with the HOA rules. We clearly expressed what we wanted through videos and pictures. The project was outside of the "Typical Strang injected design aesthetic , however Jason assured us that their firm can customize to our needs .
Our first meeting with Max was via Skype, as he sat in his Colorado office. After that, we never heard from him again. We were thrown into a whirlwind of fresh out of school architects running the Miami and Ft. Lauderdale offices. Meeting after meeting, we were sitting around a bunch of pencil pushing amateurs pretending to know what they were doing, while Max Strang hid in the Colorado Woods.
We were dragged along for 6 months, being shown the same unsystematic designs that looked like a pile of lego blocks pieced together with a haphazard floor plan, disorganized room connections and a confusing front elevation. Everything was a "rinse and repeat" version of previous designs . Time and time again, we resent HOA Regulations along with revisions redirecting them to our original plan, only to be ignored. Most of everything in the design lacked consideration for our vision and also the Housing Organization Rules .
To make matters worse, Jason Adams, who runs the firm for the absentee Max, even tried "up selling" tactics by redesigning our plans to a 15,000 square ft home instead of 8,000, which increased our cost by double!!! and in turn would increase his own profit off of the percentage.
After 6 months of being blindsided and mislead we finally fired them and walked away losing our initial deposit of 20k. Max didn't even have the decency to call us ,instead Jason Adams and Max Strang attacked and berated us in numerous emails blaming us for their bad designs. It became very clear that they never had any intention of designing our vision, nor did they have any consideration for the HOA Rules , they simply wanted to do what they wanted which was the "Strang typical design" that he does for all of his clients.
In the end, we learned a great lesson . Thankfully we hired a new award winning Architect who is highly respected all around the country. Working with a new architect confirmed all of our doubts that we had working with [Strang]. As of matter of fact, we were able to get everything we wanted with the new firm without an issue which only proves that our experience with [Strang] was unnecessary. read more
