Follow this 3-part series on how to design a variety of apartment unit types, and learn how to organise and connect them into a well-planned, cohesive layout for a complete building. Whether you're designing a compact urban building or a large-scale residential complex, this workflow will help ensure clarity, flexibility, and design integrity throughout.
Detailed Modeling in Giraffe: A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Apartment Typologies
This article breaks down a detailed modeling workflow in Giraffe, a powerful platform for urban planning and design. Learn how to create accurate and efficient apartment typologies, leverage usages for nuanced area calculations, and integrate your designs into larger building flows. This guide is based on the techniques discussed in the video and provides a comprehensive understanding of the process.
Keywords: Giraffe, modeling, apartment typology, urban planning, design, usages, grid, snap, flow, data dictionary, block base point, design software, parametric design, architecture.
The Foundation: Building an Apartment Pattern Book
The initial goal is to develop an "apartment pattern book" or a set of apartment typologies. This library of reusable designs allows for efficient building design by stringing together pre-defined apartment configurations into larger structures. The core of this process lies in accurate and detailed modeling within Giraffe.
Precision with the Grid and Snap Tools
Giraffe's grid system is fundamental to accurate modeling. Here's how to leverage it:
1. Enabling and Editing the Grid: Turn the grid on and customize its size to match your project's modularity. For example, setting the grid to 0.6 meters (600 mm) provides a fine-grained control over dimensions.
2. Snapping to the Grid: Holding the `Shift` key while using the rectangle tool (`R` key) enables snapping to multiples of the grid. This ensures precise dimensions, crucial for consistent apartment layouts. For example, you can easily create a 7.2m x 6.6m rectangle that perfectly aligns with the grid.
3. Precise Dimensioning: Input specific dimensions directly. Giraffe accepts direct numeric input for width and height. For example, defining a queen bed as 1.53m x 2.03m allows for accurate space planning.
Leveraging Usages: Defining Space and Functionality
Usages are key to defining the functional aspects of your model. They allow you to assign specific properties to different areas within the apartment.
1. Accessing the Usage Editor: Find the Usage Editor in Giraffe's interface.
2. Understanding Key Usage Properties:
Efficiency: This defines the percentage of a drawn polygon that is considered usable. This is particularly useful when accounting for wall thickness. If you explicitly model walls, set the efficiency to 100%. Otherwise, reduce it to account for the space occupied by unmodeled wall.
Color: Assign a color to each usage for clear visual differentiation within the model.
No Facades: Hides the facades (sides) of the 3D block representing the usage, providing a clean representation of the floor plan.
Hide Floors: Hides the floor (bottom) of the 3D block, further simplifying the visual representation.
Hide Verticals: Hides the vertical lines defining the height of the 3D block.
Slab Thickness: Sets the thickness of the floor slab. For example, setting this to 0.2m defines a 200mm thick slab.
3. Applying Usages: Select a polygon and assign the appropriate usage (e.g., "Living," "Bedroom," "Balcony"). Use "Relink to Usage" to revert to the usage's defined color if you have overridden the color manually.
Advanced Modeling Techniques for Walls, Doors, and Dimensions
Wall Creation:
Rectangle Method: Draw rectangles representing walls and apply the "Wall" usage.
Line and Offset Method: Draw a line, apply an offset to represent the wall thickness, and then apply the "Wall" usage. This method is useful for creating curved or complex wall geometries.
Door Indication: Create small gaps in the walls to indicate door openings, enhancing the realism and clarity of the model.
Dimensioning:
Use the dimension tool to add accurate measurements to your design.
Leverage the `Snap` key to align dimension lines to the grid.
Customize the end arrow and start arrow length of the dimension lines for a cleaner presentation.
Use the Chevron to quickly drag in a dimension on either side of a wall.
By using a `.` followed by a number like `.1` the chevron will move in that direction `0.1m`
Copying Properties: Use the `Y` key (Eyedropper tool) to copy the properties (including usage) from one object to another, streamlining the process of applying consistent attributes.
Integrating into a Building Flow
After creating individual apartment typologies, the next step is to integrate them into a larger building flow.
1. Grouping Apartment Typologies: Select all elements of an apartment and group them together. This creates a reusable component.
2. Defining an Insert Point: Crucially, add an "insert point" to the group. This point will be used to accurately position the apartment within the flow. Add the property "block base point" and set it to "true" to designate a point as an insert point for Giraffe.
3. Data Dictionary Integration: To reference the apartment typology in the flow, add its name (e.g., "1S" for a shallow one-bedroom apartment) and width to the data dictionary. This dictionary maps apartment names to their corresponding dimensions, enabling intelligent placement within the building design.
4. Using the Mix Input: Within the flow editor, use the "Mix Input" to specify the sequence of apartment typologies. For example, `"2 Start Cap 1 C 1 S"` would place a two-bedroom start cap apartment, followed by a one-bedroom core apartment, and then a one-bedroom shallow apartment.