Fit-Out & Finishing

Fit-out is the trade where every other trade's mistakes show. Ceilings hide ductwork and sprinklers that were never coordinated, partitions meet floors that are out of level, and a door set ordered late holds up the whole floor. A fit-out package is therefore written around coordination: one set of shop drawings, one programme, one snag list.

Scope runs from shell to occupied. Gypsum board partitions (ASTM C1396 board on ASTM C645 framing), suspended ceilings, flooring in porcelain, vinyl, epoxy, carpet tile or raised access floor, joinery, painting, doors, glazing and the MEP alterations that follow the new layout. Fire ratings in hours and acoustic ratings come from the specification and SBC 801, and landlords in malls and towers add their own approval steps before work starts. Substrate moisture and levelness are checked before any flooring goes down, because adhesive-fixed and resilient floors fail on damp or uneven slabs.

Healthcare fit-out is stricter. Clinics, day-surgery units and laboratories need hygienic finishes such as welded-seam vinyl or monolithic epoxy floors and wall protection, ventilation to ASHRAE 170, and coordination with medical gas and isolated power under NFPA 99. Work next to an operating facility needs infection control measures and staged handover, so rooms open in phases instead of all on one day.

Retail and hospitality work runs to dates that cannot move: a mall opening, a hotel launch, a season. Out-of-hours working, phasing and mock-up approvals go into the programme from the start. Civil Defense inspects before opening, so fire stopping, exit signs and extinguishers are on the checklist from week one and not on the day-before list.

Send the architectural drawings, the finishes schedule, the MEP drawings, the landlord's design guidelines if there are any, the site city and the date the space must open. The offer separates the finishing trades from the MEP alterations so each can be checked.