Before executing the renovation, we need to design and plan the layout for our home. Just like most people, we started off by visiting interior design firms and giving them our home layout for them to design for us. Despite seeing a few designers, we did not engage their service. Why? Because I have ideas of what I want and some of them just purely draft out my ideas on the paper. I'm not impressed! Some were really good by designing form scratch without us telling him what we plan to have... which is good because they are not taking my ideas and simply draft them. To be honest, its tiring going from design firms to firms.... and most importantly we have to take into consideration the package price and worthiness.
So in the end we decided to design our own interior, keeping it simple, functional and of course pretty! With that, we need a platform for us to draft our ideas. I did a search online and ended up using this
floorplanner website. Its is pretty easy to use plus its free!
There are definitely other software that are better but this has what I needed. Perhaps next time i will venture into other interior design software but for now, we are sticking to this.
It allows you to create your own space with exact measurements and you're able to view it in 2D or 3D form which is nice! It gives you better idea how your house or room will look like after adding certain furnitures or wall colours etc. I specifically think its awesome for gauging the furniture you are planning to buy for a specific area since it will let you see how much space you have or how everything will fit in or not. It helped me decide which sofa I should buy to fit into the tiny space of ours!
You can create the layout for your entire house. This is the plan view of our home and it let us see at a glance what we have as a whole.
Then you can also create layout for specific rooms, and view it in 2D or 3D.
3D view is especially great for you to see the space that you have, and let you know if that dining table is too big or small or whether is there space left for walkway.
This is our office/guest room. You can play around with the items they have. I wouldn't say they have tons of items but there are the basic ones... so play around with it! For example, I needed a daybed but they don't have one. So I used a sofa and simply adjust the size to the size of my daybed and viola! I am still able to see the actual space that the bed will take.
It can't be compare to those that designers use, but it does provide you with an idea how your house or room will look like and how feasible your designs are. I would recommend those (especially newly weds) who are on a budget or those who intend to do your own interior design to give it a try.
Pinterest is a great place to source for ideas and you can also follow my board
here! Interior design firms usually charge high prices although they provide a one stop service (design and renovate), but you can definitely save by creating your own design, getting contractors and doing DIYs. We try to do as much DIY as possible, it saves cost and I love doing it! It gives me a sense of accomplishment. :)
Have fun in designing your home!
