How BIMx Helps Our Clients See, Understand, and Shape Their Future Home

One of the persistent challenges in architecture is the gap between what a designer can see in their head and what a client can read from a drawing. Floor plans and sections communicate a great deal to people trained to interpret them. For most clients, they communicate considerably less. That gap, left unaddressed, produces misunderstandings that are expensive to resolve once construction has started.

BIMx is one of the tools we use to close it.

RISE team reviewing a project using BIMx, with the 3D model visible simultaneously on screen and tablet. This is how design decisions get made: in front of the model, with everyone looking at the same information

What BIMx Actually Is

BIMx is a platform that allows clients to explore a fully three-dimensional model of their building from a phone, tablet, or browser. No specialist hardware, no software to install, no training required. You open a link and you're inside your building.

This isn't a rendered fly-through or a fixed animation. It's an interactive model that you can navigate yourself: moving between floors, opening up sections to see how the structure works, isolating specific rooms or details, and examining the building from any angle. The model contains the same information we're working from in the studio, which means what you're looking at is the actual design, not a simplified version of it prepared for presentation purposes.

We share models with clients via simple web links throughout the design process, not just at formal review stages. If you're on site and want to check something, or you're at home and something occurs to you at 9pm, the model is there.

What It Changes in Practice

The most immediate benefit is that clients catch things they wouldn't have caught from drawings. The number of times someone has navigated into their future kitchen in BIMx and immediately said "actually, can we move that?" or "I didn't realise how that would feel" is significant. These instincts, acted on at design stage, cost nothing. Acted on during construction, they're expensive.

It also improves the quality of feedback we receive. When a client can see exactly what they're commenting on, the feedback is more specific and more useful. "The window in the bedroom feels too low" is more actionable than "something feels off about the bedroom."

We use BIMx's cutaway and layer tools to focus the conversation on specific elements. If we're discussing the kitchen layout, we can isolate that part of the model. If we're reviewing the structural strategy, we can strip back the finishes to show how the building is put together. This ability to control what's visible makes design reviews more efficient and more productive.

Sun Positioning and Environmental Analysis

One of the less obvious features of BIMx is accurate sun positioning. You can set the model to show how sunlight falls across the building at any time of day and any time of year. This is genuinely useful for making decisions about glazing, shading, and planting, because it lets you see the consequences of those decisions before they're committed to construction.

For clients who want to understand why we've positioned a rooflight where we have, or why we're recommending a particular depth of overhang above a south-facing window, being able to show rather than explain tends to make the reasoning immediately clear.

On Site and in the Studio

We use BIMx on site as well as in client meetings. When a contractor has a question about a detail, or when we're reviewing progress against the design intent, being able to pull up the model on a phone and look at the relevant part of the building alongside the physical construction is considerably more efficient than working from printed drawings.

The mark-up tools allow us to capture issues and feedback in context, directly on the model, which creates a cleaner record than email chains and means nothing gets lost between a site visit and the following morning.

Post-Occupancy

BIMx integrates with facilities management tools, which means the model doesn't become redundant once the building is complete. For clients who want to use it as a reference for maintenance or future alterations, the information about what's in the walls and where the services run is all there.

Most building owners will eventually need to do work on their building. Having a navigable model that shows what's behind the plasterboard is considerably more useful than a box of old drawings, and it tends to become more valuable over time rather than less.

Why It Matters

The best design decisions are the ones clients understand, have genuinely engaged with, and feel confident about. BIMx doesn't make the design decisions for anyone. What it does is give clients the information they need to participate in those decisions properly, rather than having to trust that the drawing they're looking at represents something they'll be happy with when it's built.

We've had clients share the model with their children to get their input on their bedrooms. We've had clients walk builders through the design in BIMx before work started to make sure everyone understood the intent. These aren't things we planned for. They're what happens when a tool genuinely makes a design accessible to everyone who has a stake in it.

If you're planning a project and want to understand how we'd use BIMx in the process, we're happy to show you.

→ Email us at architects@risedesignstudio.co.uk
→ Or call the studio on 020 3947 5886

RISE Design Studio, Architects, Interior Designers + Sustainability Experts

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