NEW DIMENSIONS IN HOME DESIGN From 3D renderings to virtual tours, building and buying homes has gone high-tech. By Kate Robertson
20
Right Sizing
Summer 2021
To build your custom dream home, once the only option was to tell an architect what you envisioned, then they’d draft blueprints. Maybe they would also draw a rendering of the outside design of the home, using vanishing point technique, to give a 3D perspective. Perhaps, for a major commission, they’d even create a scale model, taking weeks of meticulous work to build. Gone are those days. For the past several years, home builders and designers have used 3D technology, which allows you to make choices beforehand and easily see exactly what you will end up with, every step of the way. During the design phase, 3D software can give clients a better sense of the space and help with colour and material choices. Log-home producer Pan-Abode International uses SketchUp, which allows the designer to change things like colours, ceiling styles and interior wall finishes until the client is happy with the result. “For customers, the biggest wows come from the first conceptual drawing of their Pan-Abode home. For many, [the vision] has been in their heads and various inspirational images they’ve been collecting, and it all comes together,” says Pan-Abode’s vice president Kelly Marciniw.
