Mortar vs Gather for interior design studios
Gather and Mortar both put the FF&E list at the centre of the project, so they get compared more than their customers overlap. Gather is built for commercial and hospitality FF&E teams: specification packages, issued revisions, purchasing and shipment tracking at the scale of a hotel or an office fit-out, with Studio McGee among the firms on its homepage. Mortar is built for residential studios that need the budget, the schedule, the client's approvals and the orders on one list the client can open.
If you issue 300-line specification packages to a general contractor, read Gather's side carefully. If you're a studio of one to ten people running homes, read ours.
Comparing more than these two? See our full roundup of interior design project management software.
Written by Darren Clark — Founder of Mortar — 25+ years building software
Last updated November 4, 2026
Quick verdict
Choose Gather if your work is commercial or hospitality FF&E, you issue formal spec packages with revision control to contractors, and you want an API or AI agents working across hundreds of items. Choose Mortar if you run residential projects, your client needs to see the budget and approve selections without a login, and you want invoicing and payments in the same place as the orders.
Side by side
How they stack up
Mortar
$59/user/mo
Unlimited projects, every feature, no onboarding fee — 7-day free trial, no card, no demo required
Best for: Residential studios that specify, order and bill the product and want the client in a portal, from one seat up
- Paste a product link and the details fill in, plus Save to Mortar for trade portals
- Live room and project budgets: on track, approaching, over, visible to the client at the level you choose
- Finishes schedule with reference codes and issued revisions that can't be edited
- Branded client portal with no login, price visibility per client, supplier hiding
- Quote requests, a Quote Inbox for forwarded supplier quotes, purchase orders, supplier payments
- Lead times on every item, with late items flagged against the build start
- Invoices from approved items, deposit and balance, paid by card or bank transfer
- Payment fees published on the pricing page, including Mortar's share
- MCP connector, so Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor can work in your projects
Gather
$228/mo
Core, billed annually, 5 seats included, extra seats $31/mo; Core Plus $276/mo (+$36 a seat). 30% off versus monthly; 25% off the first year for new customers; demo before the trial
Best for: Commercial and hospitality FF&E teams that issue formal specification packages, and, on Core Plus, run purchasing and delivery tracking in-house
- Web clipper that captures products with images, details and attachments as you browse
- Detailed FF&E specifications with custom fields, components and quantities by area
- Specification packages, client approvals, locked and dated issued sets, changes marked in later revisions
- Preliminary budgets and allowances, budget vs actuals through to order costs (Core Plus)
- Purchase orders and PO revisions, deposits and payments recorded against each PO, shipment and delivery tracking (Core Plus)
- API and MCP access on both plans, with AI agents for checks, updates and reports
- No client invoicing or client payments listed; Gather describes itself as "not an accounting, invoicing, or time-billing system"
Feature by feature
Mortar vs Gather: feature comparison
Feature | Mortar | Gather |
|---|---|---|
Pricing model | $59 per user / month, from one seat | $228 or $276 / month billed annually for 5 seats, extra seats $31 or $36; Gather's own blog lists monthly from $199 |
Trial | 7 days, self-serve, no card | Free trial after a demo; no self-serve signup |
Product capture from the web | ✓ paste a link, Save to Mortar | ✓ web clipper |
Specification depth | Finishes schedule with codes, issued revisions | ✓ spec packages with custom fields, components, quantities by area |
Client approvals | ✓ in a no-login portal, per-client price visibility | ✓ clients approve or reject in Gather; login model not described on their site |
Live budget | ✓ room and project, shared with the client | ✓ allowances through to order costs, on Core Plus |
Purchase orders + shipment tracking | ✓ POs, supplier payments, lead times, late flags | ✓ on Core Plus, with PO revisions and delivery tracking |
Client invoicing + payments | ✓ deposit and balance, card or bank | Not listed on Gather's site |
Payment fees published | ✓ on the pricing page | n/a, no client payments |
API / MCP | ✓ MCP connector for Claude, ChatGPT and Cursor | ✓ public API and MCP on both plans, plus AI agents |
Market | Residential studios | Commercial, workplace, multifamily and complex residential FF&E teams |
A closer look at Gather
Gather makes "everything your team needs for complex FF&E work". The workflow runs from the web clipper to specification, to issued packages with revision control, to budgeting and, on Core Plus, purchasing and delivery tracking. It is unusually open: a public API, MCP access on both plans so Claude or ChatGPT can work directly in a Gather workspace, and AI agents that run checks and reports across a project. Its own comparison post pits it against DesignSpec, Specsources and Fohlio, which tells you the market it's in.
Pricing on the site is annual: Core at $228 a month and Core Plus at $276 a month, each with five seats included and extra seats at $31 or $36. Annual billing is 30% off the monthly rate, and Gather's own comparison post puts monthly billing from $199 with one seat. New customers get 25% off the first year. There is no self-serve trial; you book a demo and the trial follows.
Where it stops, by its own site: Gather doesn't list client invoicing or client payments, describes itself as "not an accounting, invoicing, or time-billing system", and its client approval flow is built around issued specification packages rather than a running portal. For a residential studio that bills the client for product, that half of the project happens elsewhere.
What are our strengths?
Mortar
- Your client opens the project from a link and sees the budget, the selections and what's waiting for their decision, at the pricing level you've set
- Ordering and billing are on the same item: quote inbox, purchase order, deposit and balance invoice from one list
- Fees are printed on the pricing page: card 3.3% + 30¢, bank 0.4% capped at $15
- Sized for a studio: $59 a seat, no demo, no five-seat minimum
- Works the same in Sydney or London as in New York: USD, AUD, GBP, EUR, NZD
Gather
- Formal specification packages with custom fields, components and quantities by area
- Locked, dated issued sets with every later change marked
- Purchase orders with revisions and shipment tracking through to delivery (Core Plus)
- A public API, MCP on both plans and AI agents across a project
- Built and priced for commercial and hospitality teams, with Studio McGee among the firms on its homepage
Which one is for you?
When to choose each tool
When to choose Mortar
- You run residential projects for clients who need to see the budget and approve selections without a login
- You bill the client for product and want invoicing and payments in the same place as the orders
- You're a studio of one to ten people and don't want a five-seat minimum or a demo to start
- You want the payment fees in writing on the pricing page
When to choose Gather
- Your work is commercial or hospitality FF&E at the scale of a hotel or an office fit-out
- You issue formal spec packages with revision control to contractors and purchasing agents
- You want a public API and AI agents working across hundreds of items
- Client invoicing isn't part of your workflow, or it happens somewhere else
Frequently asked questions
Is Gather for residential designers?
It can be used that way, but it's built and priced for commercial FF&E teams. Residential studios will find the spec depth more than they need and the price per seat higher than tools built for them.
Do both connect to Claude or ChatGPT?
Yes. Both Mortar and Gather offer MCP access, so an AI assistant can read and update projects. Our earlier blog post called Mortar one of the first in the category to do this; Gather has it too, so we've said so there.
Which is cheaper?
For a studio of one to five people, Mortar: $59 to $295 a month against Gather from $228 a month on annual billing, or from $199 on monthly. For larger commercial teams on Gather's five-seat annual plan the per-seat gap narrows.
The verdict
Different jobs, one list each
The client is in the room with Mortar: they open the project from a link and approve selections where the budget lives, and the invoice comes off the same list as the order. Gather's list is the specification package, issued to a contractor and locked on the date it went out, with purchasing and delivery tracking behind it on Core Plus. If you issue packages to a GC on a hotel, Gather's depth matters more than a client portal. If you run homes and bill clients for product, Mortar is the one built for you, at $59 a seat with no demo in the way.
See Mortar
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