ArtiCAD-Pro was installed over six years ago for Poole-based kitchen designer, Kitchen Elegance. Now ArtiCAD-Pro’s sister product, BathCAD, is in constant use for the recently formed Bathroom Elegance.

ArtiCAD:  An Elegant Solution

Chris Bundy and Elaine Plank, designers at Kitchen Elegance and Bathroom Elegance respectively, both believe strongly that customers now expect to see 3D visualisations of their proposed rooms as part of the sales process. 

The quality, flexibility and ease of use of the ArtiCAD-Pro and BathCAD products are contributing significantly towards the company’s ongoing growth and success, despite an increasingly competitive marketplace.

Kitchen Elegance

Founded in 1986, Kitchen Elegance has an impressive two-storey showroom just outside Poole in Dorset. Selling to both private customers and to the trade, the company designs some three hundred kitchens each year, based on products from manufacturers such as Rational, Liecht and the well-known hand-made specialists, Underwood.  The designs are complemented by top of the range appliances, including those from Gaggeneau, Sub Zero & Meile.

Having been established for over two decades, it is not surprising that much of the company’s business comes from personal recommendations and referrals.

This is complemented by advertising in local magazines and the visibility of the company’s showroom, which draws in a considerable amount of passing trade. 

Prior to installing ArtiCAD-Pro, Chris Bundy and his fellow designers would produce hand-drawn plans and visuals.  “It could take a day to produce the designs for a single kitchen, and it was a laborious and very time-consuming task.  Customers’ requested changes were, quite frankly, a nightmare.

“ArtiCAD-Pro has changed all that.  Plans and visuals – including detailed colouring and rendering – are all quick and easy to produce.  We build about five kitchens a week – some of which are very large – so our ability to turn around designs fast and without any hassle is absolutely critical."

“We have definitely found that it is easer to sell our higher value kitchens, in particular, using ArtiCAD-Pro because it makes it so much easer for the customer to see what the finished room will look like.  It gives them the confidence to give us the business.

“It’s a competitive world out there.  We need to make ourselves stand out from the crowd, and with our ambition to be the top kitchen design company in the region, the combination of our long-standing reputation, our showroom and a powerful CAD product, are all helping us to achieve this.”

Bathroom Elegance

Business is brisk for Bathroom Elegance.  The company has six designers who are using BathCAD constantly.

Elaine Plank has been a bathroom designer for several years, and had been used to producing hand-drawn designs.  “It would take me about two hours to do a drawing.   Using BathCAD, the time is halved and of course it is very easy to make changes.

“Our customers absolutely love to see their proposed bathroom designs produced using BathCAD, including details of all the finishes, colours and different viewpoints.

Bathroom design can be challenging.  Space is frequently at a premium, and the designer must often work with the existing placement of pipework, plumbing and electrics.  The use of BathCAD ensures that the best possible use can be made of the available space.

“We use BathCAD to produce designs for bathrooms, cloakrooms and wet rooms.  Several of our customers have two or three bathrooms in their house.  The speed and flexibility of BathCAD allows us to create completely different designs and styles for each of these rooms.”