Start designing your home with these home design tools
You’ve decided you want to build a new home. Where do you start? First, we suggest that you purchase your land, as this will certainly affect the design of your home. Second, start putting your ideas together before you visit your architect.
Start with a vision for your new home. Is there a particular architectural style you prefer? Colonial? nose? A salt box? A farmhouse? From there, start with the basics of home design. How many bedrooms will you need? Do you want a master bedroom with or without a master bath? Will it be on the first or second floor? If this is a vacation home that will become your retirement home, you may prefer to have the main rooms located on the first floor for easy access in the years to come. Do you want a large eat-in kitchen or a separate dining room?
Are you planning to entertain small or large groups of people in your home? Is the Cathedral Great Room on your priority list? Will you need a den or media room separate from your Great Room? Do you have a particular hobby or interest that requires a separate room or area?
Compare all of these areas to your current home. Does the space you have now meet your needs? Write down the dimensions of your space and then note whether the space is enough or not. Where possible, look for areas to reduce living space. For example, if you now have a large laundry room and only actually use half of the space, mark it as a potential savings spot. Every time you reduce the square footage of your new home, you’ll save money on upfront material costs, but also on energy costs over the life of the home.
A home serves many purposes, but it can also satisfy a host of personal, aesthetic, and emotional demands that may be difficult to put into words. As you begin to envision the design of your home, it will help your architect if you identify and communicate how you want each space to be I feel it. how?
You may find it challenging to explain how you want a room to feel. Start with a few simple exercises. Pick up a home magazine or imagine a home you know. Find a room you like. What do you like about it? The way the afternoon sunlight casts shadows across the room? The intimacy of the room or its abundant space?
Think of other places you like – the park, the library, your friend’s house. How does the space make you feel? What creates this feeling? Be specific and write what you like about it. For example, you could write, “I love how the color tones of the room change as the sun sets,” or “I love how nature is brought inside.” These small implementations will help the home design evolve from a floor plan to a custom home that is an extension of your life philosophy.
Do this for every room in your home design. It’s also helpful to describe what you don’t like about certain floor plans, rooms, or space. For example, if you don’t like going through your closet to get into your master bedroom, document that. Maybe you like the great room in a magazine photo, but you don’t like the TV being the center of attention. Or you may love the space but find it lacks the intimacy you’re looking for in your home—a cozy nook where you can chat with another couple, a well-lit reading area, or a secluded spot for your cell phone chargers, mail, and telephone. Keep all your notes together. Cut out whole pages or small pictures that describe your likes and dislikes. As you go through this process, you can update your thoughts with text and photos. Eventually, you’ll come to a good understanding of how you want your custom home to look and feel. Bring your notebook to your first meeting with your architect. Starting with your vision in hand will speed up the design process while ensuring success.
Yours custom home architect will spend time with you to guide you through this process and translate your ideas into a preliminary draft for your consideration and review. The result will be much more than a home with a standard floor plan – you’ll have a custom home design that fits your philosophy and lifestyle, a reflection of who you are, your dreams and aspirations.
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