You will need:

• scratch paper, graph paper, or drawing paper
• ruler (optional)
• Design® Drawing 3800 Pencils-HB or Prismacolor® Turquoise® Pencils-HB
• Pink Pearl® or Magic Rub® Erasers
• Sharpie® Ultra Fine Markers

Architects draw floor plans to show how buildings will function. What rooms will the building have? Where will they be located? How will you get from one room to another? Where will the windows and doors go? These questions and more are answered by drawing a diagram as seen from above. So grab some paper and plan the layout of a building!

Make a list of all the rooms you think you will need.

1. Decide what kind of a building you will be drawing. A house? A shopping mall? A bank? A church?

2. You can draw your floor plan by addition or subtraction.

Addition means you draw the core room, then add more rooms to it. This usually gives your house an irregular shape that can be interesting.

Or you can draw using subtraction by starting with the outside shape of your house. Then divide the shape into interior spaces. This is a good way to plan your house if you need the footprint of your house to be a certain size or standard shape.

Tip: Graph paper makes it easy to measure the sizes of rooms, doors, windows, kitchen and bathroom fixtures etc.

Tip: Architects use many different tools to make their drawings neat and accurate. Rulers or "straight-edges" will help you draw straight lines.

3. You can use simple symbols to make your floor plan easy to read. Here are a few suggestions.

Bathroom

Bushes

Doors

Stairs

Closet

Windows

4. Now draw a sketch on scratch paper to decide where you want your rooms and how they will connect. You may want to label your rooms. Then draw a final version on drawing paper or graph paper. Use a pencil and draw lightly so you can make changes.

5. When you are happy with your drawing, draw over the pencil lines with a Sharpie Ultra-Fine marker to make the floor plan permanent.