Sully v. Pratt

Citations

• 106 La. 601

Syllabus

<p>Syllabus.</p> <p>1. The fact that an owner, who had engaged an architect to design a building and prepare plans and specifications, afterwards changes his mind and does not erect the building, and that he has benefited nothing by what the architect did, while entitled to some weight in fixing the amount of compensation to be paid the architect, cannot, in the absence of an agreement to that effect, defeat the architect’s recovery.</p> <p>2. An intending builder, by calling upon an architect to prepare plans and speci fieations which he afterwards receives, renders himself liable to pay for them whether they are used or not.</p> <p>8. Courts will adopt with caution a rule which binds an owner to pay a percentage on a building such as the architect sees fit to figure out, and at a price which he, or the builders to whom he sends the plans put upon its probable cost.</p> <p>4. There is in such a rule too much inducement to architects to make the piano expensive for it to be readily accepted.</p> <p>5. An owner, who is not apprised of a schedule of charges obtaining among architects and had no knowledge of the same, is not to be held bound by such schedule.</p>