How do architecture and interior design firms get client approvals and sign-offs on the record?

The short answer

An architecture or interior design firm gets client approvals on the record in four moves. Give every approval its own row on the project board, with an approval status, an approved date, the approver's name and the version they approved. Send the request from that row, by email or by a form with a signature question. File the client's reply in the row's update thread, where it's timestamped and attributed. Then let a rule chase anything that has sat at Pending for seven days.

The client never has to log in to anything. The shared board and the portal app are for the client who wants to see status, but most clients want an email on Friday. The tools change, but the three parts stay: a row, a date, a thread.

Step 1 Decide what needs a formal approval

Formal approvals cover the deliverable that ends a phase: the schematic, DD, permit and bid sets. They also cover every selection the client pays for: a finish schedule, a fixture package, the millwork details. Add every change order, every additional service and the invoice the contract ties to a phase. The hundred small answers inside a phase stay informal, as email and a note on the task.

If the client could later say "I never agreed to that" and it would cost the studio money or a week, it's an approval row. On a residential job, that's fewer than ten rows from schematic to permit. A studio that creates forty has made approvals a chore nobody keeps up.

Step 2 Give every approval a row

On the project board, in the phase it belongs to, give each approval its own row with six columns. Approval is a status with four values: Pending, Approved, Revise and Rejected. Approved date is a date column, filled the day the client says yes in writing. Approved by is text, the name as they signed it, since the client is often two people or a contractor signing for an owner.

Version is the set date or revision number, with a link column to the PDF in Dropbox. That matters: the client approved the March 14 set, not the April 2 one. Owner is the person at the studio who sent the request, and Due is when the schedule needs the answer.

Approval is its own column, not a value in the task status. An approved set still has work after it, and a status column holds one value at a time. In the interior design version, the same six columns sit on the procurement board, one row per specified item. The interior design guide has that board in full.

Step 3 Send the request from the row

The kind of approval decides between two routes. A phase set or a selection goes by email, with the row's name in the subject and the version in the first line. Attach the PDF or the Dropbox link, and ask in one sentence for a reply with the word approved. Anything with money attached, a change order or an additional service, goes by form.

monday's forms share by link, and every question writes into a column of the board. The question types include a single select, a long text and a signature, which lands in a files column (support.monday.com, October 7, 2026). The form is a link in an email, so the client needs no account. Either way, the request leaves from the row, so the row exists before the request does.

Step 4 Record the sign-off in the update thread

When the reply comes, forward it to the row's own email address. It posts on that row as an update, with its attachments (support.monday.com, October 7, 2026). An update is monday's word for a comment. Then set the approval to Approved, fill in the date and type the approver's name.

Updates are timestamped and attributed to whoever posted them. Eighteen months later, when the question is which date and which drawing, the update thread is the audit trail. monday notes that deleted updates cannot be recovered (support.monday.com, October 7, 2026), so the studio rule is: nobody deletes anything on an approval row.

Write up a verbal approval, on site or by phone, as an update the same day. Use plain words: "Approved by phone, 3:10 pm, Tuesday, October 6, the March 14 set, by the owner." Email the same sentence to the client, so there's a copy in their inbox. An approval stays off the record unless someone writes it down the day it's given, and no tool fixes that.

Step 5 Share a view when the client wants status

Most clients want an email on Friday. For the client who wants to see status live, monday's route is a shareable board with the client as a guest. Shareable boards start on the Standard plan, and a guest sees only the boards shared with them. Three guests are free on Standard, then every four count as a seat; Pro allows unlimited guests. A guest must use an email domain different from the studio's (shareable boards and guests, support.monday.com, October 7, 2026).

Set the board permission to view and comment. Under that setting, "non-owners can view items and post updates and replies without changing item fields or structure" (board permissions, October 7, 2026). So the client can read and reply but cannot move a date.

The shared board holds that client's approvals, the milestones and the current set. It never shows the project board itself, with its staff notes, or the CA log, hours or any fee. Build the shared board separately, fed from the project board. Once a board is shared, everything on it is the client's to read. monday.com Pro sets permissions per board, not per column, so every column stays visible to the client.

Step 6 Add the follow-up rule

After seven days at Pending, create a chase task on the owner's own list, dated today and named for the row. A task, not a notification: notifications get read on a phone and forgotten, but tasks sit on a list reviewed every Monday. A second rule notifies the lead PM when the approved date is set. The next phase then starts the day the answer lands, not the day someone notices.

Two rules are enough. A system with twelve approval automations leaves its owner unable to say why a task appeared. The same seven-day rule runs the CA log and the interior design procurement board, so staff learn one habit instead of three.

Step 7 Decide whether a client portal app is worth it

Add a portal when three things are true at once:

• Clients expect a branded page rather than an email.
• More than a dozen clients are active at the same time.
• The drawings, milestones and feedback need to be in one place the client opens without being taught monday.

Until all three are true, the shared board and a Friday email do the job, and a portal is a subscription nobody opens.

Gorilla's client portal for architects, a monday.com marketplace app, is the one to trial first. In its own words, it lets clients "follow project progress, access drawings and documents, and provide feedback without exposing your internal boards". It gives "each client access only to their own projects" and collects "feedback and approvals on drawings", and clients need no monday.com account. Its site shows no price and offers a trial through the monday marketplace (getgorilla.app, read October 7, 2026). We have not run it in production for a client, which is why it's a trial and not a recommendation.

For an interior design studio, Studio Designer names a client portal in every plan it publishes, next to procurement and billing (studiodesigner.com/pricing, October 7, 2026). A studio already on it should use that portal rather than add a second.

Step 8 Build the same thing outside monday

The method needs a row per approval, a date and a thread, so you can build it in any tool that has them. In Asana, each job is a project, each phase a section and each approval a task, with custom fields for approval status and approved date. Paste the client's reply into the task's comments. Send the request through a form. Asana says, "When someone submits a form, a task is automatically created in the connected project with the form responses added to its details" (asana.com/product/forms, October 7, 2026).

In Notion, approvals are a database with a status and a date property, and the thread is the comments on each approval's page. The request is a Notion form, whose "responses live in Notion" (notion.com/product/forms, October 7, 2026).

With email and a spreadsheet, keep one sheet with a row per approval and the six columns. Save the client's email as a PDF in the project's approvals folder in Dropbox, named with the date. Each approval's owner reads the sheet every Monday, which is the follow-up rule done by hand. In every tool, what fails is an approval that lives only in someone's inbox.

Compared with the alternatives

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