Duxborough Designs

We had worked with a few architects/designers prior to Doug that did not meet our expectations and thought the renovation/redesign to our cape house was not going to be possible. We then found Doug at Duxborough Designs and he was fantastic. Doug listened to us, came up with some great ideas and even showed us some built in cabinet designs in his house (through video calls). This was all done during COVID which was difficult since we could not meet face to face and what he designed for us, was beautiful, thoughtful and has met all our requirements. We would recommend Doug to anyone as he is very knowledgeable, easy to work with and most of all a very good listener.

I had had a great experience working with Doug! His designs include the little details that set his homes apart from others. He is great to work with since he has the eye of both an architect and a builder. He is very patient and has been a strong guide throughout the process. Never having built a new house before and coming from a house built in 1729, Doug has made the process easy and stress free. I would highly recommend him to anyone looking to design a new home.

I can not recommend Doug enough. Our new home has exceeded our wildest dreams. I feel Dougs ability to listen and formulate a vision from our jumbled thoughts were what made this happen. I found Doug to be friendly, honest, hard working and very fair with his pricing. We interviewed several candidates for our design project and found most to be very narrow and somewhat tunnel visioned with what they thought we should design. There was not much "thinking outside the box". Doug was different. He digested every word we spoke and came up with a masterpiece. As an aside, I am confident that when that day comes for us to part with our dream home, his participation with our project will return us much more in dollars than we would normally expect. He has been a great investment.

I highly recommend choosing Doug Friesen to build you the home of your dreams, or whatever the project is that you are looking to design. Doug was recommended to us by a builder because of the beautiful architecture he can create in any space, and his sense of design, but how his designs are easy to work with and bring to life. My husband and I project managed our home renovation and addition addition ourselves, so we really feel so fortunate to have found Doug because he helped us in so many ways. We knew that investing in Doug would be worth it. Working with Doug was a great experience as he worked hard to create our dream home and made it fun along the way. Doug's building experience helped us design our home and make it functional while beautiful and also to complete the structural aspects of the home building plans. He helped us to complete a room by room plan that helped us with the interior and exterior design, lighting and bath fixtures we would need to pick out. What was great about working with Doug is that he supported us through the entire process after designing, such as what we needed to submit for our permit, working with structural engineers for the plot plans, and getting our current foundation approved. The uniqueness of our house could not have been created by anyone else. His talent, great communication, building expertise and good taste make him an amazing architect! Thank you Doug for all your support, hard work and sharing your talent with our family!

Doug was so GREAT to work with and would highly recommend. He was very professional about his work and had such great vision for what WE wanted, not just what HE wanted. We were able to change our plans around and see different versions of layouts, one/two bathrooms, where closets were put etc Since our house has been completed we get so many compliments on the architecture of the house and I know we are as happy as we are in our newly renovated home because of the work he did for us.

My wife and I found Doug to be prompt, enthusiastic and awesome to work with. He went above and beyond our expectations. I highly recommend him and without question would use him again.

Doug’s background in construction making vision a reality is seem-less. Also his willingness to work along with my general contractor was great. Could not recommend him enough. Top notch!

Having never built a house, we knew zero going into the whole process. We had such a great experience with Doug, we decided to build another home using Doug. He is very knowledgeable and understanding thru the whole process. Would gladly use him again.

We have done two projects with Doug several years apart. Most recently he designed a sizable addition to our house. Doug is a pleasure to work with and excels at turning our vague ideas into fully realized and well designed plans. He is thoughtful, creative, and a great communicator. And, to top it all off, he's timely. We cannot recommend him highly enough.

As the owner of New Leaf Building and Remoldeling LLC, I highly recommend Duxborough Designs. Doug creates realistic drawings that provide a seamless transition from paper to the job site. Building experience clearly shows in Dougs designs, His well thought out plans and attention to classic New England detail will provide the client confidence throughout the entire project.

I have worked with Doug for many years. Our initial meeting was through a clients project. Since that time I have recommended Doug to many of my own clients and have hired him for several of my own projects. I would highly recommend Doug and Duxborough Designs for his intimate knowledge of building construction as well as his design sense and capabilities. Doug does an impeccable job of listening to the client and translating their ideas into a working set of construction plans. Doug is a huge asset, and adds value to every building project he works on.

One of the reasons I chose this firm was because they furnished 3-D renderings. This made it easier for my wife and me to see what our finished project would look like. Doug is easy to work with and made change to the project as we sat with him. While the project is not yet complete, I have no doubt that Doug will stay on top of things.

Doug listened to our needs and was able to create a design for our new home that exceeded our expectations while respecting our budget. Would highly recommend!

Doug Friesen of Duxborough Designs is a true professional. He designed a freestanding carriage house for us that seamlessly complemented our existing home. Not only does Doug possess great aesthetic sensibility, he is also reliable, timely, and a stickler for the tiniest of details. We highly recommend Duxborough Designs for your next project -- be it large or small. You will be delighted with the finished product.

Even though we are still in the design process, we are pleased with the design process to date. Doug is great at getting back to us when we have questions, comes up with alternate options when something is not working for us, has taken us to see 2 finished projects. We hope to put our project out to bid very soon and to have the project complete by Fall 2018.

I worked with Doug Friesen at Duxborough Design to create and design a 3 car detached garage and an addition to our existing house. Doug took our ideas and created an initial design which we then tweaked to arrive at our final design. The process worked very well and Doug is great to work with. Our goal was to create an addition that looked like it was always part of the original house design and I think we accomplished that goal. IF you like the New England style, Dougs a great place to start. I will upload a few photos soon

We hired Duxborough to help us design and build a carriage house/barn on our property. We had three very difficult design conditions: 1) our property is in a historic district and as such has additional design review, 2) Our lot size and shape was is very constrained and required zoning variance and special fire code issues and 3) we were on a tight budget. Doug was flexible, creative and helped us successfully navigate the complicated permitting process. Doug approached the project with sagacity acquired from years of hands on experience and maintained a positive attitude even when we required multiple design iterations to satisfy our special permitting conditions. Doug also helped us find a high value contractor that we could trust and that worked with us to stay within budget while building a structure that we could be proud of.

We are planning to build a 4000 square ft. lake house in New Hampshire. Duxborough Designs was referred to us by a mutual friend. Doug is responsive and easy to work with. He gave us access to his design software which allows us to walk through the house at every step. This has been invaluable because we can make changes to the floorplans easily and without extra design time. Because Doug has a building background, he can tell us what works and what doesn't. This saves us time and money. We look forward to completing our design soon.

Doug was highly recommended to us as an architect with a great vision and as someone who liked the challenge of working on a uniquely designed home. Our project fell into the latter category and after our first meeting with Doug, we knew we'd found the right guy. Our originally designed solar "earth" home needed a second floor and a overal. reconfiguring aka gutting of the entire first floor. We were intent on trying to keep many original features of our former home as possible and Doug worked hand in hand with our builder to make this happen. Doug's experience and vision, as well as flexibility to ideas is what we liked so much. He is extremely knowledgeable about various types of architecture and is easy to work with. He designed a second floor addition with two bedrooms, study, full bath, deck and staircase adjoining lower deck. He also reconfigured our main floor and designed a large open living room/kitchen space, compete with island and fireplace. We would not hesitate to recommend him.

I found Doug Friesen through Houzz. I live in Massachusetts but am building a home in a CT shoreline community, so had begun working with a local designer there. After eight months of frustration trying to work with the CT-based designer (during which he didn't listen to my ideas, didn't make agreed-upon changes, didn't meet deadlines, etc.), I decided it was time to cut my losses. Thus, my search on Houzz found me Duxborough Designs. I met with Doug and immediately like his approach......he listened and asked questions, showed me some of his work in progress, and talked about fees. I immediately hired him to complete my house design. The entire process has been very pleasant and on schedule. Doug has a vast amount of design and construction experience such that he's able to suggest ideas that enhance the home. He pays attention to detail and is patient in explaining his perspective. Construction has just started, and Doug is happy to take calls from subcontractors with questions. In short, it's been a great experience working with Doug, and I will certainly use his services again for future design projects. I highly recommend him for his design work and pleasant, calm demeanor.

Doug has that rare combination of design and building experience. This means his designs are grounded in reality while still being beautiful. He is really strong on wood finishes which was really important for our project. The most important thing about Doug is that he is personable and easy to get on with. That really helps when there are so many moving pieces in a project!

Doug Friesen is the consummate professional. He was very easy to work with. Always returned your call in a timely manner. Whenever I wanted to make a change, he'd make an appointment ASAP at no additional charge. We even had a meeting while I was babysitting my grandchildren. He met with us while his wife played with the grandkids. His design more than met our expectations. I'd highly recommend Doug.

My husband and I worked with duxborough designs on a recent major renovation on our house. Doug from duxborough designs is extremely talented and was such a pleasure to work with. Doug has the ability to design houses with such character while making it functional. We could not be happier with what he did for us and would highly recommend him.

Doug is in the process of helping us renovate a 1892 farmhouse that has not been updated in 53 years. Doug realized that we wanted to keep the flavor of the original home and not make it into a re-do that looked like it was just built. He lent an ear, heard what we wanted, and offered professional insight on things we hadn't considered. Most of which we are incorporating. Very pleased.

We hired Doug to design our addition in Hingham. We had a 1960 split ranch that we wanted to put a 2nd floor on. We had some basic ideas, but Doug took it to another level. The trims and finishes he added really make the addition blend into the rest of the house. We have been thrilled with the design and layout and often people stop by to comment on it. We are about 70% into the project and can really see his ideas coming alive. Doug is always very responsive and listened to our wish list and ideas intently while adding his professional opinions and thoughts. We could really get a good feel of the interior layout with his 3-D designs. As the interior walls are going up it is coming out exactly as we had on paper. We would highly recommend Doug and Duxborough Designs for any project. Bill & Karen

Doug provided us with an initial consultation after which we accepted his proposal to guide us through the concept and ultimate design for our major house addition and renovation. Being new to this experience of going through what for us was a major project, Doug exhibited extreme patience and professionalism as we asked a lot of questions and went through a couple of design changes. Ultimately, he delivered true to his proposal which allowed us to obtain several bids and the construction permits with a very skill ful contractor who he recommended. We are very happy with Doug's service to us and would highly recommend him to anyone doing anything beyond a simple project.

I retained Doug to do the redesign of my 1925 beach house on Ocean Street in Marshfield, Mass. It was a total redo and expansion as the house was unheated and not insulated. Doug has a terrific eye and given the small lot size there were a number of design trade-off's that needed to be made throughout the process. Doug was a true professional and a trusted advisor who worked collaboratively with myself and Scott Murphy, the builder. He helped me to achieve a nice balance of retaining the original cottage charm while modernizing and upgrading the space. I am extremely pleased with the result and would highly recommend Doug for your next project.

We had never built a home before. We were going in totally blind. From a photo of home we saw in a magazine, Doug was able to work with us, and designed a home that exceeded our expectations. Easy to work with , and when we needed to make changes, Doug responded quickly. MJW

I am a builder/developer and Doug has designed two homes for me. I could not be happier with how easy Doug is to work with. Most architect/home designers have their own idea on the house you are designing and often impose their views. Doug listens and creates a design based on youir input and does not try to force his own biases. With both homes, we were able to arrive at a design within several meetings and he completed the construction drawings in a timely fashion. Doug has been a pleasure to work with.

We hired Doug to help us renovate a portion of our historic home in Duxbury. He listened closely to what we wanted to do and made great suggestions to improve upon it. He was there step by step going the process of getting us a permit. Doug brings a great deal of practical experience to to the job. We highly recommend him.

I worked with Doug Friesen at Duxborough Design to create a design and building plans for renovations to an 18th century colonial. Included were designs for a new garage, as well as converting the ell of the home, currenty non-livable space used for storage, into a family room. The challenge has been to find the right balance for the historic nature of the house, modernization, and budget, and we feel Doug has kept a sharp awareness of all those things through the design process. This is our first renovation to our home, taken on with much trepidation on my part, and it has been very reassuring to have Doug, with a particularly good knowledge of building, guide us through the process.

We engaged Doug of Duxborough Designs to work with us to create our new, shingle style home. We brought many design ideas and shared our Houzz Ideabooks with Doug throughout the process. Doug took our "basket" of ideas and created an initial design which we then tweaked to arrive at our final design. The process worked very well and Doug is a pleasure to work with. He offers seasoned opinions (he was a builder before going full time into design) but does not force his ideas. He has a terrific eye for the details that make a great design. We recommend Duxborough Designs highly!

My wife and I were planning to build a new house. One of the builders we interviewed who has an impeccable reputation for quality suggested we talk to Doug Friesen about designing the house. We brought Doug a floor plan we saw on the Internet that contained some of the things we wanted in the house such as a master bedroom and a laundry room on the 1st floor but it needed a lot of work to get the look and flow we wanted. Doug made several changes to the 1st floor until it looked just the way we wanted it and he designed the second floor completely. The process went amazingly fast. Including the first draft it took only three drawings to get all of our primary objectives incorporated into the plan. After that there were several small changes such as moving a closet or adding or removing a window. Working with Doug was a very interactive process where he listened carefully to our ideas and offered several of his own as the project took shape. While the floor plans are certainly important the design of the exterior stole the show. The 2nd floor is recessed over the 1st floor with very interesting roof lines that really make the house pop. I'm told the 3 foot skirt that surrounds the bottom of the 2nd floor is called a Dutch roof. The house fits beautifully into the neighborhood but at the same time its unique features are not lost or overshadowed by the properties around it. Finally, Doug has invested in 3D software that you can run on your own computer to allow you to see the house from every conceivable angle. You can remove the roof, the floors, etc. and tip the house to look inside the fully configured and furnished rooms. As you use the software to pan around the house - inside or out you will think you are watching a video. Doug will work with you to design the house or renovation you are looking for until you are happy. He can also recommend quality builders in your area. I would highly recommend Duxborough Designs and I thank our builder, Jack Mitchell for sending us to Doug. Greg Cunningham

Duxborough Designs helped us with a design of a farmers porch to help us achieve a wonderful outdoor space to view a scenic river. The challenge was to work within the scope of a Conservation Committee's requirements but while still meeting our needs as a homeowner.

Our project was complicated by a restricted envelope, on a hill, in another state from our current residence, with a program of aging in place. Duxborough Designs was our third attempt to get it right and we were successful for several reasons. Doug is a builder by background with a good balance of cost and design. We were able to view the design in 3D and it was invaluable in making decisions. The design was completed in the time and cost laid out in the contract with the exception of a few hours that I needed to spend with Doug and the program trying out various design options.

We have hired Doug to do our last two remodels and additions on our last two homes. The first project that Doug did for us was a entire kitchen remodel, he took the time to meet with us several times as we had no idea what exactly we wanted to, he took the time to draw out every option possible until we got exactly what we wanted, turns out it was the first thing that he proposed. The next project was a bit more complicated as we are adding an addition to an old house that is both in the front and rear of the house, a new 780 square foot deck that part of it is over a walk out basement and doing a kitchen remodel. The plans were done exceptionally well, we were included every step of the way on all the details, all of the details blend into the house, you cant tell the new from the old. I would strongly recommend Doug to anyone looking to have any kind of design work done. The computer renderings are a must, this allows you to see exactly what your project is going to end up like long before work has begun.

When you use Doug for your project you get want you want plus more. He consistently exceeded my expections in terms of quality, speed, creativity and price. It's no wonder that many of the high end home builders on the South Shore in Boston prefer to work with Doug and recommend him to their clients. His name came up over and over. Doug is a very pleasant fellow. It is very easy to work with him. He basically came up with what we were looking for in our home rennovation almost first shot. There were few revisions and the 3D technology Doug uses really helps you envision the end product. No need to work about whether this guy will get back to you. He answers his emails and calls quite promptly. All I can say, if you use Doug you won't be disappointed.

Worked with Doug Friesen of Duxborough Designs to design our renovation and addition. He was great to work with. He has a excellent eye for integrating an addition into an existing house. He listened, incorporated our ideas and added numerous other good suggestions. His background as a builder was invaluable, as there were no surprises when it came time to submit our plans to the town and work with a contractor. The space has become our central living area. Kitchen has the open plan we wanted. What was a three season breezeway porch was opened up and turned into a greatroom adjacent the kitchen with support columns framing our new island. Ceiling, which was flat is now cathedral which creates a beautiful, bright space. Doug knew we wanted a light space so he incorporated skylights. The 3-D views he provided made the plans so much easier to visualize. Great job!

I really enjoyed working with Doug. He was pleasant, accomadating and very caring from the very beginning to the very end. He demonstrated to me that he has alot of knowledge and experience in building and design which is exactly what you need when building your dream home. He started and completed the scope of our ageement on time and I felt confident that he would do a great job throughout project. I felt that the service Doug provided was great value. In fact he exceeded my expectations. I was especially happy with his skill at creating the 3D Imaging. What a joy it is to scroll around my future home inside and out before I purchased a single piece of lumber. I highly recommend Doug Friesen.

I had been thru 3 architects and had no Joy...too slow, too expensive, too fixed in their ways and not listening. I found Duxborough through the contractor and was hesitant at first...but once we started he was fast, accurate, had good ideas, solved problems and LISTENED to me and my wife. The result was a great design, with many suggestions that helped. We wound up with an efficient house that was cost consciously designed and built. Doug is very responsive and understands building as he was a builder prior to his design career. He is not ego-centric and he applauds your good ideas and takes time to explain why some of your crazier ideas might not be the best solutions. I recommend him highly

We met Doug while searching for a new home. Our realtor recommended him to us. We knew we wanted to find a place in town and then renovate it. Doug actually worked with us on 2 posibilities that fell through and then with the 3rd which we bought. He did the leg work on all 3 with the town hall and the building inpector to make sure we could do the renovations we were thinking of for them prior to making an offer. While working with Doug on our plans we found him to be very professional - always willing to meet with us and incorporate the changes in the designs to meet our vision. Doug went above and beyond to make sure our permits were in order. He actually attended 2 different Town Building Design meetings with me to answer any questions they had regarding our plans. He gave us an estimate and stayed true to that .... He worked well with our builder and the job went smoothly. I would definite use Doug again in the future. WE LOVE OUR HOUSE !! It is exactly what we wanted -- thanks to Doug and our builder.