The Hidden Bottleneck in Architecture

Ask an outsider how architects check if a building design meets code, and they’ll usually say something like: “There must be software for that.”

There isn’t. Not really.

Most firms still handle code compliance manually. They copy-paste from PDFs, highlight tables, dig through dense legal language, and try to cross-reference requirements across dozens of documents, often under deadline pressure and with zero margin for error.

It’s one of the most important parts of a project. And it’s still stuck in the 1990s.

Modernist government building under an exaggerated sun on an orange sky, symbolizing the heavy, outdated systems behind architectural code compliance. — Most architecture teams still manage code compliance using outdated, manual workflows, dragging contemporary design into bureaucratic quicksand.

The True Cost of Manual Compliance

Building code compliance isn’t just a headache. It’s expensive.

Architects burn days reviewing life safety and accessibility rules by hand
Code consultants get looped in late and waste time re-checking assumptions
Reviewers interpret things differently depending on the jurisdiction
Small changes in the model can trigger hours of rework
Errors mean costly delays, resubmissions, or worse, built mistakes

For something so critical, the process is surprisingly ad hoc. Even large firms rely on internal experts and institutional memory to "just know" what’s allowed.

In any other industry, this would be automated by now.

Why There's Still No Standard Software for It

BIM didn’t solve this. Drawing tools didn’t solve this. They weren’t built for it.

Most architecture software focuses on documentation or coordination. Code compliance is different. It’s about aligning legal rules with spatial data and that’s always been hard to translate into software.

You can’t just write a checklist. The rules vary by jurisdiction. They change often. They’re written in legal English, not engineering logic. And they don’t always map cleanly to building geometry.

That’s why most attempts at “code-checking software” have failed. They either oversimplify the rules or require so much manual input that they defeat the point.

AI-powered building code compliance software visualized through a futuristic urban skyline, symbolizing automated code checking for large-scale architectural projects. — Large-scale projects face thousands of potential compliance issues. AI-driven building code compliance software like Kestrel helps architects identify risks early, speed up approvals, and reduce costly delays.

A Better Way to Do This

What if building code compliance software actually understood the code?

Not as text. As logic.

What if you could:

Upload a model
Choose your jurisdiction
And get instant, structured feedback on what complies, what doesn’t, and why

That’s the idea behind Kestrel.

We built a system that turns the building code into machine-readable logic. It understands spatial relationships. It maps requirements to real geometry. It explains what’s wrong, where, and how to fix it.

Why We Started Kestrel

We weren’t trying to build another drawing tool. We were trying to fix the part of the process that quietly breaks projects behind the scenes.

Every project team has wasted time, money, or reputation because of avoidable compliance issues. We knew there had to be a better way.

So we built one.

Code Compliance Shouldn’t Be a Bottleneck

It shouldn’t take a week to get an answer on corridor widths. You shouldn’t need to memorize 900 pages of fire code to do your job. You shouldn’t be stuck guessing what the reviewer will flag.

The tools exist now to make this better: AI that can read legal text, reason about geometry, create structured rule systems that actually scale.

It’s time to give architects a way to move faster, and with more certainty.