Hi- I am pretty competent in the French language but prefer, in matters of business, to have the discussions in my native language, English. So does anyone know a reasonable building project manager who can work with a local, French speaking architect and also act as my advocate and as a liaison with the builder? The site is near Bellême France.
What you are looking for is a maître d’œuvre. Your local mairie probably has a list or the local business directory/chamber of commerce.
I think the spelling is maître d’oeuvre . Yellow pages gives you names but I also think word of mouth is important. We found a m-d’o through asking our builders. The point is they need to trust him and he’s likely to have to be local, otherwise they probably won’t want to come and work for you.
Our guy was superb - for example at 7 in the evening we met with the tiler who was supposed to be doing our kitchen. It became evident he didn’t want to go for our choice of tile but to use his own supplier who no doubt was giving him a cut. By 9pm our m-d’o phoned to say he’d found us someone else who did a great job.
Ours spoke no English, but we did manage most of the time - not much comfort I know, but as a breed they are few and far between.
1 Like
amended, thanks 
1 Like
I don’t have any personal knowledge, but your query interested me since we visit the Perche for a few weeks each year.
Following a suggestion above, I put “maitre d’oeuvre” into pagesjaunes.fr with a town name. Belleme got no hits, but there is one firm at Le pin la garenne and another one at Mortagne. Their websites are in French and I skimmed to see if they listed other languages but I didn’t come across it. Maybe some delving would turn up that info.
Approaching it from the English-speaking angle, I thought of an architectural firm at Bazoches sur Hoene, and since they are Dutch I’m sure their English is excellent. Whether they would act as your maitre-d’oeuvre or not, they may know of someone who can help you.
VPBA, http://www.vpba.eu/
I hope you find someone, and please update Survivefrance as your renovations go along.