Modelrooms was invented by me Katie Galvin, in Dublin, Ireland.

I'm a Space Planning fanatic. I'm not and architect, but I have worked for Architects for over 20 years as a modelmaker. Having helped friends and family get to grips with their plans I wanted to find a way to make architectural plans more accessible to non-architects.

While trying to help my brother understand his house extension plans I could see that he was stuck in 'decision paralysis' with 2 very different layouts to choose from.

Looking at plans with no furniture is difficult ... as homeowners we relate to furniture and physical stuff way better than empty room shapes. Once he added scale furniture to the plan he said it felt like someone "turned the lights on". Within hours he knew exactly what he wanted and was ready to move forward with his plans. 

One option was a full width extension at the back of the house. The second option was an L shaped extension which was longer but left a courtyard enclosed on two sides with glass. There were pros and cons to each layout. Once he started playing around with the sofa and dining table in the layouts he had a very clear picture of the flow of both spaces. There was a very clear winner for him and he had the confidence to move forward with that layout.

Understanding how this flow works is noting more than running through your daily scenarios on your room plans. Plan out your proposed layout and pretend to walk into the kitchen as you come home from work (we even give you magnetic people to do this). 

1. Where do you put your bag of shopping? 

2. Is the fridge near that so you can get the milk put away quickly?

3. While you are at the fridge is there room for everyone else in the house to come and go to other parts of the room? 

4. Next, do you normally plonk at the kitchen table and have a cuppa. If so, where is the kitchen table located? 

5. If someone else is watching TV will that interfere with your quiet moment at the kitchen table? 

6. If it bothers you, can the TV be moved further away? 

7. What other scenarios are typical throughout your day.

And so on like this to get a feel for your future home so you dont miss a trick... this is the essence of good flow. 

It's not rocket science. If you live in the house you are probably best qualified to do this exercise. It is really just a series of questions ... leading to more questions ... and with a visual aid to see the flow in action. Our kits are perfect for doing this, but if you don't have one you can even cut up pieces of paper to make scale furniture on your plan. An hour of test driving your plans will almost always catch (at least) one snag you would otherwise not spot untill it is built.

You may be suffering from the dreaded 'blank page syndrome' where you are totally stuck for ideas. So start with what you have now and work out what is wrong with your current layout. Or maybe you may know what will work best for your space already. Either way if you can't communicate it clearly, then it may not make it to your finished house. Once you get your architect or builder on board with your vision you can move it to the next phase of your project.

Imagine getting your new layout figured out and knowing that it is the perfect arrangement for your space before starting to build?

Plans are easy to understand if you are looking at them everyday for a living but to a non-designer they are far from easy. Our kits use a graphic style so you can quickly create a plan that is simple and easy to understand, and where everything is set to scale for you. We deliberately designed it to simplify the plans for speed and ease of use. It is not intended to replace the technical drawings needed for the builder but rather to work alongside them. If you are an Interior designer you will love that the layout can be figured out intuitively early on in the process. It means there will be far less changes later because your clients didn't understand their plan. 

If you are renovating you will love it because you can pour over your plans and get clarity on your overall layout early. Feel confident that your layout works before the expense of having the plans drawn up, or worse before building something that you later want to change.

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