Hypothetical situation…………..
A capable person has a vision of a home. Lets say he has a clear vision of the exterior and some what of the interior spaces.
I guess my question is, do you design a house from the outside in or the other way around.
In other words, does an architect or a designer first draw a picture of the exterior and then perhaps the footprint and then fill in the interior spaces?
Or is it done in some other fashion altogether?
Thanks,
Eric
Replies
They really go hand in hand but more often than not I sketch a few elevations by hand, establish a rough footprint in Cad and lay out the floorplan. I actually keep my mind on the roof more than the elevations as I'm tweaking the exterior walls around.
The floor plan and several wall sections are usually done before I turn my attention to elevations. Once I have a few wall sections done the floor, window, ceiling, roof, eve lines and parapet heights are all determined. The elevations go pretty quickly after that.
Kevin Halliburton
"The Greek comic poets, also, divided their plays into parts by introducing a choral song, ... they relived the actor's speeches by such intermissions." Vitruvious, (Book V)
I usually start with a beer.
Then I look at the client's constraints. Might be a lot size or shape. Might be a favorite possession. Might be a relationship of two rooms to each other. Might be a preference for a style. Might be budget. Or, more than one.
These set boundaries on the design, and then the picture fills itself in in my head both inside out and outside in at the same time. I think visually and 3D, so the house forms itself mentally and I can actually picture the clients moving around the house and doing their daily stuff.
A lot of time is spent at the beginning staring into space, or wasting time on Breaktime. But that's only using a coupla brain cells (puts my posts here into perspective, huh?) and mostly I'm incubating ideas for the current house. I work alone be/c it'd be hard to convince a boss that I'm really, really working!
Did I mention that beer helps?
Just kidding.
I usually start with a beer.
Just one? Ok done.
A lot of time is spent at the beginning staring into space, or wasting time on Breaktime. But that's only using a coupla brain cells (puts my posts here into perspective, huh?) and mostly I'm incubating ideas for the current house. I work alone be/c it'd be hard to convince a boss that I'm really, really working!
Did I mention that beer helps?
Alright I gotta piss after reading that............ok I'm back. Well, I'm on the sam etrack as you I'm just not sure whether the beer is working as good as yours.....whatcha drinkin?
I saw your most recent design ( the castle). you actually build that stuff. WOW. Looks like Tele Tubbies Paradise. I have your design as my desktop right now.
Thanks for the reply.
Eric
>you actually build that stuff
Have built. Now I prefer to let others build it. Get more done faster that way.
And of course joking about the beer as design inspiration...it only inspires me to open another.
I can't tell for sure, but sounds like your vision is more of the style and look of the exterior and certain rooms, rather than function and relationships. If so, keep it in mind, but that all comes later.
I start with the site. Consider direction of sunlight, views, topography, driveway access, special features, neighbors, utilities, well, septic, etc. For example, in a cold climate like New York you'd generally want the garage on the North side to reduce heat loss and because you don't get much light from North facing windows. Rooms you want sunny would be on the South side, etc. But, all those other factors work into it too.
Then I go to functional layout, based on both site and relationships. For example, you generally want the kitchen off or very near the garage so you can carry groceries a short distance and enter onto a floor that's fairly easy to clean. Generally bedrooms are separated somewhat from living spaces for noise and privacy. You don't want to have to pass in view of the living room to get from the bedroom to the bathroom, for example. It's at this point I think of whether the house should be one floor or more than one. The site influences this, too, of course. I often draw informal circles on paper, like a Venn diagram from seventh grade math, just showing what spaces need to be near others and what needs to connect.
Then it gets more detailed, considering stairways, furnace and water heater, spaces for ductwork, closets, etc. Then, where do you want windows in the rooms, then, how do those windows look when arranged on the outside facade? There's lots of going back and forth. How will your furniture be arranged? And the roof; you don't want to dump snow and rain onto your entrances.
It takes lots and lots of tries before it really starts to come together. If something does not feel right, try again till the whole thing flows smoothly and you can just float around the house going about your day. Get lots of opinions from people who will be forthcoming. It really takes months 'till it all starts to come together.
Thanks Wayne,
I think I should have asked about siting first, I kinda skipped over that.
Truth is, I'm trying to figure a rough cost for a house in order to decide whether or not our budget will buy a piece of land and build a house. So I figure to determine the cost of the house I need a plan. I can do a sq ft. but I haven't built anything since 1996 and I KNOW material costs have risen since then.
So I figure I should have at least a decent plan to do a take off on in order to keep the math good.
Plan I have in my head is reversable I think. I'm actually thinking of a modeat 'Carriage House', garages in front, ground level, walk up the middle to living and 2bedrooms, walk up again to unfinished future rooms under roof.
If the lot is pitched then put the garages in the back and I have basically a Cape from the front.
What do you think?
Thanks
Eric
I can't quite picture it. Generally, I don't like the garage to overpower the appearance of the front of a home. But, if you put the garage in the back, and there is much of a slope, you have to imagine how the driveway will work, including in the winter. You also don't want the water to run down a hill into a garage. Everyone's taste is different, though, and you should build what you like.
I built a home way upstate in 2000 at an actual cost of about $90 per square foot, not including land or landscaping other than grading and a lawn. Prices have gone up since then, and labor is probably much higher in your area, but this gives you a general idea. One thing I don't regret is extra insulation. My heating bills were quite low and the house was very warm in winter and cool in summer.
See what others have to say.
As a couple of others have already mentioned, "designing" a house is a lot more involved than "drawing" one.
Design is a matter of defining the problems and criteria you are trying to resolve and then addressing that "program" with architectural solutions. The program always comes first or you haven't defined the equation you are trying to solve with architecture.
Start by examining your current home. How do you use each and every space? What are it's strengths and shortcomings? What are the problems with your current house that you are hoping to resolve with a new one? Whether you design it yourself or take it to someone else this is probably the most important work you will do in your design. Take your time at this stage and everything else will go a lot easier.
When I designed our house I created a separate sheet in a notebook for every room. I wrote down all the activities that would take place in each space and then I looked at rooms that could be combined or that would support the functions of adjacent spaces and tried to group them together.
I wrote down the energy level and personality I wanted each space to convey - Lots of energy and warmth in the kitchen but more calm and serene in the bedrooms for example. I wrote down the time of day the room would be used and how much natural light I wanted in the space at that time of day. That helped establish where the rooms needed to be located on the floorplan.
I thought about traffic flow and what rooms I wanted to enter and exit the house through. I tried to create isolation between the quiet spaces and the rowdier ones and distinction between private and public.
I mentally came home, entered the virtual house and walked through the spaces a thousand times. I imagined coming in with a car full of groceries then I imagined coming in from several hours of yard work. I made dinner, set the table, cleaned it all up and put it away. I washed the car and the dog, I collected the laundry, washed it, ironed it and put it away, etc..
Then I imagined I was doing all that from a wheelchair.
I thought about how I wanted to feel as I walked through each door and tried to figure out how to create a home that would accommodate me through each of the tasks in a given day.
Once I had my expectations clearly defined, then I hammered out a floorplan that roughly addressed the program and ran through all of the above scenarios on paper over, and over, and over again until it all flowed like I wanted it to.
I worked my way out from there to the spaces around the house, the approach to the house and the entrance to the driveway, picking views and site elements I wanted to highlight. I went so far as to download satellite photos of the surrounding valley and set the house on the site with the survey coordinates. I then projected lines from the house for several miles around it to insure that all the views were perfectly framed by the windows...
Then I asked my wife for her input... and changed everything. :-)>
Bottom line, don't get too far ahead of yourself drawing the solutions until you have the problems and expectations clearly defined. Program, program, program... then draw and revise.
Good luck!
Kevin Halliburton
"The Greek comic poets, also, divided their plays into parts by introducing a choral song, ... they relived the actor's speeches by such intermissions." Vitruvious, (Book V)
There are quite a few good ideas in this thread.
You should know how you live, how you want to live, and how you think you'll live in the future.
What spaces are important, which ones aren't. Devote square footage to where it'll be used and appreciated. Don't be shy erasing the footage that won't be used.
You do have to plan based on your building site. Solar, site elevations, viewlines, setbacks, etc.
What rooms should get morning sun vs afternoon.
Kevin really hit the nail when he wrote something laong the lines of "virtually living" in your plan. Envision the day-to-day tasks, and try to see how rooms and walls and doors and windows and stairs, etc, relate to how you live.
Some general ideas that you could incorporate? Stacked plumbing, or shared plumbing walls will help. Laundry near the bedrooms, or will you drag it up/down two flights of stairs and through three rooms to get to the basement laundry? Garage access? Stairs?
Blending the desired layout of rooms with the intended exterior style of the house (cape, colonial, etc) usually works it's way out as part of the process.
Sorry I can't offer anything new, but I will second Kevin's advice to "live" in your plans.
i start with a meeting with the owners... try to find out what their needs are.. if it's a new house.. then we have a discussion about spaces... the lot... architectural styles they like and dislike..
usually things can be defined as needs and constraints... money .. site specific things lile drainage , zoning, local rules,.. utilities...
balanced against needs... bedrooms, baths , kitchen, lifestyle , family...
age and future plans... is this it ? or will they be selling in 10 years...
if this is it... then we need accomodations for first floor living... perhaps a second floor for adult children
if this is a young family, then do they want a 2 story house or a single story?
once we've outlined these i start by combining boxes ( rooms )... so many boxes on the first floor and so many on any second floor.. the size and configuration of these boxes (rooms ) will define the size of the home..
the architectural preferences of the owners will define the ultimate shape those boxes will become..
with additions.. the constraints usually define the ultimate size and shape
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
does an architect or a designer first draw a picture of the exterior and then perhaps the footprint and then fill in the interior spaces?
I was taught that good design started from the inside out. So, the living room is as big as the furniture & the activities within wants it to be. Same for the other spaces in a house. Once you know the interior volumes, the exterior is somewhat defined--as is refined by the particular style of the house. Now, totaling up the interior volumes gets another result, we get a rough square footage that lets a person track how far over budget the project is.
See, easy, any schmo can do it--just like anybody who can swing a hammer is a carpenter . . . <g>
I find, personally, that I wind up working both from within and without. I also spend a lot of time sketching room/space relationships, too. Since I have cad, I tend to test floor plans as 3d models, too. These are all personal preferences. I've also drawn some spec plans starting from just a kitche or just a fireplace too. The end results are often quite interesting (and just as often only fit to start charcoal with . . . )
Both or neither...
I have built designs that came from archies whose primary focus was interiors and they did those well, but the exterior needed tweaking to make it look lkike part of the rest of the house ( I do mostly remo and additions)
I have also built from plans where the archy had a primary focus on the facade and had no care wharsoever whether the structure or living arrangements were safe or comfortable on the interior. Spaces afoten had no apparent relatioinship to one another.
It is these conflicts in part that propelled me to become in volved in doing design work as part of my offerings because I can see all of it in one flash, and often had to redesign the work of others to provide myu clients with what they were looking for in the end.
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