Builders & renovators · St Albans · Herts, Beds & Bucks
A home should be inspiring. We build the version of yours you've been sketching.
Inspiring Developments is a St Albans building company run by its two founders, Tom Corrigan and Rob Newman. Extensions, kitchen extensions, loft conversions, full renovations and new builds across Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire — with a director on the job and a project manager on the site.
Every review names Tom and Rob
"From the start, Tom and Rob made the whole process easy." — Jenny Hills, Google
Tom & Rob
the founders run your job
Extensions
single-storey, kitchen & rear — our core work
5.0 ★
rated on Google
Herts · Beds · Bucks
the three counties we cover
St Albans builders · Tom Corrigan & Rob Newman
One firm from the first ballpark figure to the last socket.
Inspiring Developments is a building company based at The Enterprise Centre on Porters Wood in St Albans, founded and run by Tom Corrigan and Rob Newman. We deliver extensions, kitchen extensions, loft conversions, full house renovations, new builds and the external work that goes around them, across Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire.
Between them Tom and Rob have spent their working lives in construction, and they've built the company around the thing homeowners actually complain about: not knowing what's happening. So you get a realistic budget before you spend money on drawings, a priced programme before anyone lifts a tool, a dedicated project manager once we're on site, and a WhatsApp group where you can ask anything and get an answer the same day.
Start here, not at the architect
A realistic number before you spend a penny on drawings.
The expensive mistake in home building isn't the tiles. It's paying for four months of design work on a scheme that was never affordable, then value-engineering it into something you don't want. So our first stage is feasibility: you describe the house and the ambition, we give you a ballpark cost. No drawings needed, no charge, and it changes the brief more often than you'd think.
How feasibility works
Our own work — an extension at shell stage, from our Google profile
What we do
From a kitchen extension to a whole new house.
Our work
Real projects, with the story written down.
Every photograph in our gallery is our own, and every one of them has an explanation of what was actually done — not just a street name.
In their words
“IDL completed our single storey rear extension, windows and doors upgrade and full insulation and render job earlier this year. From the start, Tom and Rob made the whole process easy. They gave us a competitive but realistic quote. The dedicated WhatsApp group set up for the build meant any issues were flagged and resolved quickly.”
★★★★★ — Jenny Hills, via Google
How we work
Feasibility, design, pricing, build.
01
Feasibility
Before you commission drawings, we give you a ballpark cost for what you're imagining. It's the cheapest hour of the whole project: you find out whether the scheme in your head is realistic before you've paid an architect to draw it.
02
Design & planning
We guide you through design and planning and bring in the people the project needs — architects, structural engineers, planning consultants — so the drawings that come out the other end are buildable and priced against reality, not a wish list.
03
Pre-construction
Detailed, accurate pricing and a programme of works. This is also where we talk through the awkward practical questions — can you stay in the house, should the job be phased, where does the temporary kitchen go — so they're decided before they become problems.
04
Construction
A dedicated project manager runs the site from first dig to handover, while you and we keep working through the ongoing decisions: kitchen and sanitaryware specs, socket and switch positions, finishes. You're in the loop the whole way, on the phone and in the project WhatsApp group.
The question everyone asks second
Can we carry on living here while you do it?
Usually, yes — and we plan for it rather than around it. Temporary kitchens, temporary plumbing, phased programmes, safe routes through. One client's review mentions that we built a set of steps so their dog could still get into the garden mid-build. None of that is heroic; it's what happens when someone on site is paying attention.
Read the full guide
Where we work
Based on Porters Wood in St Albans, building across three counties.
We deliver projects across Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire, from our unit at The Enterprise Centre in St Albans. That covers St Albans itself and the towns around it — Harpenden, Redbourn, Wheathampstead, Radlett, Hemel Hempstead, Berkhamsted — and out into Luton, Dunstable and the Bucks side. If you're planning work on a home in the area, we'd be glad to come and take a look.
Planning an extension, a loft or a full renovation?
Ring Tom or Rob and describe it. The ballpark costs you nothing and takes about twenty minutes.
Mon – Fri · 8:00am – 4:00pm · Closed Saturday and Sunday · site visits by arrangement