ARCH 111

ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN 1

MODULE 101

PREPARED BY:
AR. ERNESTO B. BERMIDO, MSARCH.
What is a Floor Plan?
A floor plan is a scaled diagram of a room or building viewed from
above. The floor plan may depict an entire building, one floor of a
building, or a single room. It may also include measurements,
furniture, appliances, or anything else necessary to the purpose of
the plan.
Floor plans are useful to help design furniture layout, wiring
systems, and much more. They're also a valuable tool for real
estate agents and leasing companies in helping sell or rent out a
space.
The Importance of Floor Plan
Design
Floor plans are essential when designing and
building a home. A good floor plan can increase the
enjoyment of the home by creating a nice flow
between spaces and can even increase its
functionality.
 What are the key characteristics of a good
floor plan when designing your house?
Versatile and flexible. Make sure in the future an office can easily be turned into a child's bedroom whether for your
family or a future buyer's.
Ideal room layout. Make sure bedrooms are far from entertaining spaces. Bathrooms shouldn't face common
entertainment spaces like dining rooms or living rooms. Most people will like if the kitchen opens to the dining or
living rooms so whoever is cooking can still interact with guests or keep an eye on the kids playing.
Size matters. Whenever designing any room or hallway, think about how many people will be in that space at one
time. Do they have room to move around? Is there room for furniture to accommodate all the planned activities?
Fits your priorities and lifestyle. If entertaining is important, make sure there's a good flow from the kitchen to an
outside space and living room. If you work from home, make sure your office gets ideal light and is perhaps in a quiet
location. When you do laundry, is it ok if you have to climb three floors to get from your master bedroom to the
laundry room?
Find the balance between architectural details and practical considerations. Think about the safety of kids, cleaning,
heating and cooling bill before falling in love with some majestic staircase or floor to ceiling windows.
How to Draw a Floor Plan
There are a few basic steps to creating a floor plan:
Choose an area. Determine the area to be drawn. If the
building already exists, decide how much (a room, a floor,
or the entire building) of it to draw. If the building does not
yet exist, brainstorm designs based on the size and shape
of the location on which to build.
How to Start Floor Plan
Take measurements. If the building exists, measure the walls,
doors, and pertinent furniture so that the floor plan will be
accurate. If the layout is being created for an entirely new area, be
sure that the total area will fit where it is to be built. It is advisable
to examine buildings built in similar areas to use as an estimate
for this floor plan. Learn more about how to measure and draw
your floor plan to scale.
How to Start Floor Plan
Draw walls. Add walls for each room of the building,
taking care to draw them to scale.
Add architectural features. Begin adding features to the
space by including the unchangeable things, like the
doors and windows, as well as the refrigerator,
dishwasher, dryer, and other important appliances that
must be placed in a specific location.
Add furniture. Add furniture if the floor plan calls for it.
Completing the components;
How Elevations do?
Elevation drawings are a specific type of drawing
architects use to illustrate a building or portion of a
building. An Elevation is drawn from a vertical plane
looking straight on to a building facade or interior
surface. This is as if you directly in front of a
building and looked straight at it.
What are the three types of
Elevations.
There are different types of elevation with
respect to these specific angles. Front
elevation, side elevations, rear elevations
and split elevations are some types.
What are Elevation Plans and
How are They Used?
Once you have completed drawing your detailed
floor plans, you'll still need to create a few more
construction drawings. In addition to the floor
plans, you will need to provide your builder and
local planning department with elevation drawings
and cross-section drawings.
The elevation plans are scaled drawings which show all four
sides of the home with all perspective flattened. These plans are
used to give the builder an overview of how the finished home
will look and the types of exterior finishing materials. It will also
provide information about the elevation of the ground on the
various faces of the home. For the Municipal planning
department, they will need these drawings to insure that the
National building code is being adhered to. You will be creating
four elevation views, one for each side of the house (regardless
of whether your home is of a conventional shape or not). Usually
these drawings are drawn to a scale of 1 : 100 mts.
For each side of the house,
elevation drawings should show:
•Each wall length and its height,
•The roof width and height,
•The visible portion of the foundation,
•Any exterior features (such as decks, porches and stairs),
•Window and door trim,
•Eavestroughs,
•Exterior wall and roof finishings (e.g. wood siding on exterior walls, asphalt shingles
on roof)
•The finished ground level.
Getting Started
•To draft your elevation plans, you will start with your floor plans for
the main floor of your house. The easiest method is to draw your
elevations to the same scale as your floor plans. To make the
process a bit easier:
•Tape your main floor plan drawing to the surface of your work
table with the front side of the house facing towards you.
Tape the sheet of paper for your elevation drawing just below or
above the floor plan.
With this method you will transfer each feature on
the front face of the house to the other sheet of
paper.
The drawing to the right shows a completed
elevation drawing and the floor plan it was taken
from. The dotted lines show places where the walls
bump in or out.
Drawing Main Floor Wall Baseline
1. Using your floor plan drawings and starting at the extreme left end of any
walls on this side of the house on the ground floor, measure the horizontal
distance of this wall. Make sure you are including the thickness of any siding
material for the exterior side walls for this level. This siding can be very thin in
the case of parging or thick in the case of stone or brick.
2. Draw a faint line the same length of this wall towards the bottom left third
of your page. This faint horizontal line will later be erased since it will not be
visible from the outside of the house (unless the exterior finish of the house
changes at this exact point). It is drawn now only as a reference from which to
measure to the top of the next floor or roof line.
3. Make a small upward tick mark at the end of this wall.
4. If there is another exterior wall at the same elevation to the
right of this wall (for example a wall that bumps out or
recedes in from this first wall), measure this wall in the same
way as the first.
5. Draw this next line as a continuation of the first line. Do not
erase the tick mark that indicates the division between these
walls.
6. Continue on marking walls in this way until you reach the
end of walls on this side of the house.
Determining and Drawing Wall
Heights
Next you will draw the vertical lines for the exterior walls on this side. For each of the
wall bases:
Determine how high the wall will be above its unfinished floor height. To do this you will
need to consider the height of the ceiling of the rooms within this section of the house
and add to that the height of any floor or ceiling joists above it. Also add on the height
of any sub-flooring, if there are floors above.
Draw faint vertical lines up from each of the wall base lines to the height you have
determined in the previous step. (Later you will draw a darker line which includes the
finished material on the outside of the home.)
Draw a faint horizontal line at the level of the upper ceiling joists or subfloor above this
level.
4. If there is another floor above this level, continue on to
the step 5. Otherwise move on to the next section, Draw
Window and Door Outlines.
5. Using the floor plans for the next level up, perform steps
1 through 3 again making tick marks where you will need to
draw any vertical walls. Once again determine the heights
of these walls then draw a faint horizontal line to show the
level of the top of the sub-flooring or ceiling joists for the
next level.
6. Continue repeating the above steps until you have no
floors above the current level. Then move on to the next
section, Draw Window and Door Outlines.
Draw Window and Door Outlines
For all of your windows and doors, measure from the horizontal lines of
your floors to position the exterior doors and windows. Your
construction drawings, usually the cross-sections, will detail the height
at which each window should be placed. A separate window and door
schedule gives the dimensions for all your windows and doors.
At this point, using your architect's scale for accuracy, draw just the
outline of the window and door outside dimensions to the same scale
as your walls, floors and roof. Later you will draw the exterior window
and door trim.
Drawing the Roofs
The roof lines can be of many styles: gable, shed, hip, gambrel, etc.
To draw the roof for each elevation view, first consider whether your
roof will overhang and drop below the exterior wall on the elevation
plan you are currently drafting. For a shed or gable roof with eaves,
the roof on two sides will drop lower than where it connects with the
wall. From the view of the other two sides it will stay at one level.
Take a look at the elevations at the very top of this page to see an
illustration of this.
 Dropping Roofs
If this level has an overhanging roof that slopes down over the wall, you will need
to do some calculations for roof overhang before you draw the horizontal line for
the wall top.
If there is a roof overhang at this level which drops down over the wall, calculate
how much the roof will drop in the actual overhang area. To do this,
1. Take the slope or pitch of your roof, which is usually described as the rise over
run in the form of 5:12, 6:12, 14:12, etc. The first number refers to how many
inches (or centimetres) the roof will rise (or drop) over a horizontal distance
indicated by the second number (which in North America is usually 12 inches).
2. Take your horizontal roof overhang to determine what the vertical
roof overhand drop will be. For instance if you have a 5:12 roof pitch
and a 12 inch horizontal roof overhang, the roof will drop a total of 5
inches. If your horizontal roof overhang was 18 inches, the roof would
drop 18/12 x 5 = 1.5 x 5 inches = 7.5 inches.
3. Now you will need to subtract this drop from the height of the wall
that you previously calculated since in the elevation drawing this roof
line will drop below the top of the wall height. Using this new
calculated height, draw the line showing the lower edge of the roof
line.
 Non-Dropping Roof Lines
For an end gable wall or a shed wall, determine the highest point of the wall below
your roof. To do this you need to know the slope of the roof. First read the section
above on roof pitch, then calculate the height of top most point of your roof above
the current floor in the following way.
1. Measure the horizontal distance from one of the side walls of the house in this
elevation view to where the peak of the roof will be. For some houses this will be the
center of the house, for other roof styles it may not be the center. We'll call this
Distance to Peak.
2. Then calculate Distance to Peak x Roof slope where roof slope is the rise/run. For
example for a 5:12 roof slope and a distance of 13 feet the height for the peak of the
roof (above the current floor) would be: 12 feet x 5 / 12 = 5 feet.
3. Mark a tick on the floor surface to indicate the spot above which will lie the roof
peak. Extend a faint vertical line up from this point.
4. Measure up this line to the height you have just calculated above.
5. Now join this roof peak to the outside edge of the house.
6. If the roof slopes directly down to the other side of the house you can draw
another line from the roof peak to the other edge of the house as well.
Next determine the thickness of your actual roof including all framing and the roof
itself and draw this onto your elevation drawing.
Make sure that you have included all roofs that are visible from this house face.
Notice in the elevation above, the small portion of shed roof which covers a bump
out on the right side is visible.
Basements, Foundations and Chimneys
Detail Exterior Finishing

1. If you will have wood or another type of siding (horizontal,

vertical or cedar shake) draw these lines to indicate the finish. For
a stucco wall you need not draw any surface. For a brick or stone
wall, the finish should be drawn. Make sure you include any trim
bands, belt lines, etc.
2. Using your architect's scale, draft in all window and door trim as
well as detail any window or door lites, and exterior knobs or
handles.
Decks, Porches and Railings and
Finished Ground Level

1. Now draw in any decks or porches, their railings and

stairways. This can be fiddly work, especially drawing the
railings. Use your scale to make sure your drawing is
accurate.
2. Then add on any other architectural features such as
fascia, gutters or downspouts.
3. Next do an accurate measurement of what you plan to have as the
difference of your main floor height to the final level of the landscaping
around the house. This may be fairly flat around the whole house or it may
leave a portion of the basement or foundation completely above ground
with another part almost completely buried.
4. Draw this finished landscaping line along the walls of this elevation view.
5. Finally, clearly label the drawing to indicate exact finishing materials to be
used on exterior surfaces, this includes roofing materials and siding.
Repeat this process for the other three sides of the home.
As with the floor plan drawings, it is necessary to include a title block on the
page which specifies the house name, the date, and the scale used. The
title block is generally in one corner of the drawing.