Outdoor kitchens in Coral Gables.

The Board of Architects reviews exterior colour, materials and roofline on anything visible from a street, waterway or neighbouring lot, which covers essentially every outdoor kitchen with a structure over it. Stamped plans and a colour drawn from the city's approved palette are standard, and four to eight weeks of review comes before the building permit, not after. Miami Limestone sits shallow across the city, so footings and gas trenching regularly hit rock. On the bay-front lots in Cocoplum, Gables Estates and Gables by the Sea, salt spray off open water takes standard 304 to visible rust in two to three years, so 316 marine-grade hardware is the baseline rather than an upgrade, and shoreline-setback work needs a DERM permit first.

Buyers are largely multi-generational families building for the long haul on a fixed lot, usually running the pool contractor, the landscape architect and the Board submission at the same time. The drawing gets reviewed before the price does, which changes what a vendor has to bring to the first meeting.