Home Design and Architecture Guide

Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite

Published by Better Homes & Gardens in partnership with Chief Architect, Inc., the Home Designer Suite is an integrated collection of software tools to help you design houses, rooms, kitchens, bathrooms, and landscape features. The Home Designer Suite includes more than 1,500 sample plans, photo galleries with home design advice, and simplified versions of tools found in the Chief Architect CAD (computer-aided design) software used by pros.

What Can You Do With the Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite Software?
* View more than 1,500 sample plans
* View photo galleries with design advice
* Draw floor plans
* Design houses, rooms, decks, kitchens, bathrooms, terrains, and landscapes
* Import a photo of your home and add landscape features
* Create 2D and 3D images
* View houses and rooms from many perspectives
* Arrange furniture and plan interior decoration
* Choose from an extensive menu of options for siding materials, landscape plants, cabinets, appliances, furnishings, and other features
* Download images of name-brand products from the Web
* Match colors from any paint manufacturer
* Add labels to your designs
* Estimate building costs
* Calculate mortgage loans
* Modify and save your plans
* View online galleries of projects by other users

What CAN’T You Do With the Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite?
Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite includes CAD tools that will let you create professional-looking designs. Keep in mind, however, that the software is geared mainly for non-professionals. Here are some things the Home Designer Suite will NOT help you do:
* Add voice and sounds to your designs
* Create animated views of your project
* Design complex mechanical and HVAC systems
* Check your design against national building codes

How Easy is the Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite?
The program DVDs for Better Homes & Gardens Home Designer Suite installed easily in about 10 minutes. This software is not for the impatient, however. Once I opened the Home Designer Suite, I faced a staggering range of commands and options. Where to begin?

Designing a house with the Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite begins with choosing a house style from a short list of options such as Colonial or Arts & Crafts. The house style selection establishes a series of default values for design features and architectural details.

The next steps toward creating a home design involve drawing walls and mouse-clicking to add windows, doors, cabinets, and appliances. Literally hundreds of options can make this process baffling. Fortunately, the Home Designer Suite comes with tutorial videos bundled into the software. Better Homes & Gardens also offers free online technical support.

The Bottom Line
The Better Homes & Gardens Home Designer Suite has the power to create home and landscape designs with remarkable detail. The design libraries and huge library of sample floor plans are a plus. However, unless you are familiar with graphics software, plan to spend hours with the training videos before you are able to finish your first design.

System Requirements
* Windows® XP or Vista
* 1.2 GHz or higher processor
* 2 GB free hard drive space
* 1 GB RAM
* DVD drive

Cost
Better & Homes Gardens Home Designer Suite offers a variety of home design software packages. The Home Designer Suite reviewed here can usually be purchased for about $100$69.99 or considerably less. To find the best deal, click the “compare prices” button below.

TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro

TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro is a computer-aided design (CAD) program published by IMSI/Design. Similar to the TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect software program, Home & Landscape Pro will let you create floor plans, cost estimates, landscape designs, and masterful 3D illustrations. However, Home & Landscape Pro is more powerful than Instant Architect and has many more features.

This review is based on Home & Landscape Pro Version 12.
What Can You Do With TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro?
* Draw floor plans
* View 6 sample projects
* Design houses, rooms, decks, kitchens, bathrooms, terrains, and landscapes
* Import a photo of your home and add landscape features
* Design electrical, plumbing, heating, and cooling systems
* Create 2D and 3D images
* View houses and rooms from many perspectives
* Arrange furniture and plan interior decoration
* Choose from an extensive menu of options for siding materials, landscape plants, cabinets, appliances, furnishings, and other features
* Choose colors from a large palette of options
* Add labels and other text to your designs
* Estimate building costs
* Add voice and sounds to your designs
* Create animated views of your project
* Import your own photos for textures, patterns, and details
* Modify and save your plans

What CAN’T You Do With TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro?
IMSI TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro is a simplified CAD program that will let you accomplish many high-powered design tasks. That said, here is what Home & Landscape Pro will NOT let you do:
* Browse extended libraries of house plans and house styles
* Browse color palettes from multiple paint manufacturers
* View online galleries of projects by other users
* Get design tips and suggestions
* Check your design against national building codes

Also, note that CAD programs are not intended to let you import and edit photos of your own house. For that, you’d need a paint color software program or other type of photo-editing program.

How Easy is TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro?
Installing and activating the program DVD for IMSI TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro was a trouble-free process that took about 10 minutes. Once I had filled in my activation code number, Home & Landscape Pro opened with the same House Builder Wizard found in other TurboFLOORPLAN software. Help was also available in the 57-page Getting Started guide and a 330-page manual with an index.

The House Builder Wizard guided me through the design process by offering a series of options. With a click of my mouse, I could switch to 3D views and see my design from different perspectives. I could even view my project with eye-popping realism by wearing funky red and blue 3D glasses that came with the manual.

A paintbrush option let me choose from an extensive menu of siding materials, landscape details, paint colors, interior cabinetry, carpeting, and other features. Although I knew that more advanced features were available, I could progress quickly though my project by staying with the building wizards.

The Bottom Line
IMSI TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro is an adaptable program with out-of-the-box simplicity for beginners and powerful design tools for advanced users. In less than an hour, I was able to create floor plans and an elevation drawing. With more time (and a careful study of the manual) I was able to add greater detail and more features to my project. Home & Landscape Pro can also help plan terrains, landscapes, interior rooms, and utilities.

System Requirements
* Windows® 2000, XP, or Vista
* 500 Mhz or higher processor
* 750 MB free hard drive space
* 512 MB RAM (1 GB Recommended)

Cost
Home & Landscape Pro is available on DVD, CDs, or via download for about $43.48 or considerably less. To find the best deal, click the “compare prices” button below.

TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect V12

Published by IMSI/Design, TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect is a computer-aided design (CAD) program tailored for beginners. While it does not have all the features of more powerful programs such as TurboFLOORPLAN Home & Landscape Pro, TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect includes more than enough options to create floor plans, cost estimates, landscape designs, and masterful 3D illustrations.
This review is based on TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect.
What Can You Do With TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect?

* Draw floor plans
* Design houses, rooms, decks, kitchens, bathrooms, and garden beds
* Create 2D and 3D images
* View houses and rooms from many perspectives
* Arrange furniture and plan interior decoration
* Choose from a menu of options for siding materials, landscape plants, cabinets, appliances, furnishings, and other features
* Choose colors from a palette of options
* Add labels and other text to your designs
* Estimate building costs
* Modify and save your plans

What CAN’T You Do With TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect?
TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect is a simplified version of the kind of CAD software that architects use. Your options for colors and other architectural details are limited, but Instant Architect is powerful enough to create sophisticated home designs. That said, here are some things Instant Architect will NOT let you do:
* Browse an extended library of sample house plans
* Browse color palettes from multiple paint manufacturers
* View online galleries of projects by other users
* Get design tips and suggestions
* Design complex electrical, plumbing, heating, and cooling systems
* Add voice and sounds to your designs
* Create animated views of your project
* Import your own photos for textures, patterns, and details
* Check your design against national building codes

Also, note that CAD programs are not intended to let you import and edit photos of your own house. For that, you’d need a paint color software program or other type of photo-editing program.

How Easy is Instant Architect?
I was able to install and activate the TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect program CD in less than 10 minutes. Once I had filled in my activation code number, the Instant Architect program opened with a House Builder Wizard that guided me through the design process. Help was also available in the 58-page Getting Started manual.

The House Builder Wizard asked me to choose a from a series of options such as number of floors, overall building shape, building dimensions, and roof style. Once these basics were established, I could could add windows, doors, stairs, and other architectural features.

With a click of my mouse, I could switch to 3D views and see my design from different perspectives. A paintbrush option let me choose siding materials, landscape details, paint colors, interior cabinetry, carpeting, and other features.

At times, I wished for more options for colors, shapes, and details. However, the default menu of options provided enough details to create a sophisticated home design.

Following a similar process, I could also use Instant Architect to design a kitchen or bathroom, build a deck, plan garden beds, or simply arrange furniture.

The Bottom Line
TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect lacks some “bells and whistles,” but offers instant gratification for the novice. Using TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect, I was able to create floor plans and an impressive elevation drawing in less than an hour.

System Requirements
* Windows® 2000, XP, or Vista
* 500 Mhz or higher processor
* 750 MB free hard disk space
* 512 MB RAM (1 GB Recommended)

Cost
TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect is an affordable software program available on CD or via download. The cost is about $30, and sometimes much less. To find the best deal, click the “compare prices” button below.

What tools to draw a simple floor plan?

A new homeowner would like to draw a simple floor plan to help with remodeling and decorating projects. She write this:

“I figured I could find some simple tools on the web, but all I can find is software intended for 3-D design,” she says. “Most do not make drawing to some scale or designating distance easily.”

Are there simple online tools to help draw floor plans?

High powered home design software and CAD (computer aided design) programs can do many complex tasks and will create beautiful scale drawings. Most home design programs are fairly easy to learn, but all the bells and whistles aren’t necessary if a floor plan is all you need.

Want something even less complicated? Try one of these easy online tools:
* FloorPlanner.com
* Gliffy Floor Plan Software
* SmartDraw
* Classroom Architect

Free Tools to Choose House Paint Colors

Wouldn’t it be great to preview color combinations on your house, before spending a lot of money on paint? You can, with digital painting tools. Just point and click to see rooms, furnishings, and house exteriors in many different colors. The software and online tools listed here are inexpensive, and most are FREE! Keep in mind, however, that your monitor cannot render colors precisely. Use these digital painting tools to explore possibilities, then test spot your chosen paints in a small area.
1. Benjamin Moore Personal Color Viewer
Try thousands of Benjamin Moore paint colors. Use the free online tool to view colors on sample photos showing interior and exterior views. Or, buy the $10 “>CD and try Benjamin Moore colors on photos of your own house. Available for Windows and Mac.

2. Resene EzyPaint
Use the easy, free version on EzyPaint online, or pay to download the more sophisticated version which includes a drawing and mapping tool that lets you fine tune the areas you want to color. The Ezypaint programs are available for PC or Mac, and will let you view thousands of colors manufactured by the New Zealand paint company, Resene.

3. American Traditions Virtual Painter
Select from a palette of National Trust approved American Tradition® colors from Lowes. Try your chosen colors on several online photos of interior and exterior views. Easy to use, but the selection of images is limited. Free.

4. Sherwin-Williams Painting Images Color Simulator
Select a photograph that most closely resembles the style of your house, then choose the Sherwin-William palette to experiment with color combinations. Free.

5. Bob Vila’s Paint Designer
Home repair guru Bob Vila lets you view his Signature Collection paint colors on several different house styles. You can’t import your own photos, but the free interactive Web page includes a color wheel for easy color selection and a handy estimator tool that calculates how much paint to buy.

6. CBN Selector™
Here’s a complex and powerful tool that lets you visualize the appearance of thousands of colors on a variety of surfaces including stucco and concrete. Once you’ve selected your colors, you’ll have a precise CBN Code that will let you order the color mix you want from your local dealer. You can download this software and try it out for 30 days for free.

7. Better Homes & Gardens Color-A-Home
Register for a free log-in, then use the free online tools to view different color combinations on a variety of house styles.

8. Photo-Editing Programs
Chances are, you already have a photo-editing program on your computer. While not specifically designed to work with house painting, most photo-editing programs include tools that can help you in the color selection process. This page from Microsoft Windows XP shows how to do this using Microsoft Digital Image Suite. Other programs work in similar ways.