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Fix These 5 Common Design Mistakes FAST (Architects & Designers) — Transcript

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0:02If you're an architect or interior
0:03designer, chances are you've made at
0:05least one of these mistakes. Honestly, I
0:07definitely have, quite a few times.
0:09These aren't bad design ideas, they're
0:11workflow problems. Little things that
0:13creep into drawings and quietly impact
0:15clarity, accuracy, and presentation. In
0:18this video, I'm going to walk through
0:20five common mistakes I see and make all
0:22the time in plans, interiors, and
0:24presentations, and show you how to fix
0:27them using Rayon. But before we get into
0:29it, if you want to follow along or try
0:30this workflow for yourself, there's a
0:32link in the description where you can
0:34create a free Rayon account.
0:38This first one is a classic. Doors drawn
0:40too small or incorrectly, furniture too
0:43big, people looking 7-ft tall. Most of
0:47the time this comes from downloading
0:49random blocks off the internet. I had a
0:51full library of them at architecture
0:52school. Rayon's block library fixes this
0:55by giving you properly scaled blocks,
0:57and even better, they also give you
0:58multiple views, top, front, and side,
1:01all in one place. This is particularly
1:03useful when working across plans and
1:05sections, so you can ensure that the
1:07blocks show correctly and align to each
1:09drawing. Now, Rayon has a vast block
1:12library, and we're talking hundreds,
1:14thousands of blocks available to you.
1:16You've got lots of different options
1:17here where you can explore the library
1:19on the left-hand side, and you've got
1:21access to bathroom layouts, bedroom
1:23layouts,
1:24various different blocks, any block that
1:27you can possibly think of, Rayon has it
1:29there in their library. And this is
1:30really useful because you can scroll
1:32through and find any type of block
1:33you're looking for, kitchen appliances,
1:35kitchen accessories, to start populating
1:37your floor plans in an instant, there
1:39and then. So, what you want to do is if
1:41you find a particular item, you can drag
1:43and drop it into your workspace. You can
1:45then see that you can rotate, you can
1:47shift it. You can then start to mirror
1:49it and play around with it until you're
1:51comfortable with how you want it in your
1:52layout. Equally, you can also select the
1:54block and see alternative views. So,
1:56you've got a front view, side view, and
1:59top view. So, when you're working across
2:01plan sections elevations, you can switch
2:03between those views to make sure that
2:05your drawers align.
2:06Now, you'll see here you've got lots of
2:07different options for even potential
2:10full bedroom layouts. So, you can see
2:12here we've got a bed, wardrobe, and desk
2:14space already fully configured, um which
2:17you can then work into your floor plan.
2:20Now, alternatively, you can look for
2:22parametric blocks. And in this case, you
2:24can type it into the top here where you
2:26can search for a particular item that
2:28will have a parametric icon in the top
2:30left corner. And you can see here that
2:32these parametric blocks, when you drag
2:34and drop them in, let's take this corner
2:35sofa, for example, they have these
2:37toggles that you can essentially push
2:39and pull, and they'll expand and
2:41contract without actually distorting or
2:43affecting the geometry of the block. So,
2:46as you see here, you can push and pull
2:47it if you want to have certain elements
2:48that are longer or shorter or wider or
2:51deeper, it gives you that flexibility.
2:54Likewise, if you have certain elements
2:55like a dining room table that you want
2:58to add more chairs to, you can push and
2:59pull these. Now, for this particular
3:01drawing, this is the kind of set of
3:04blocks that I would like to use, and I'm
3:05going to start populating the drawings.
3:07Now, these are really great for also, if
3:09you want to make some edits and make
3:11some changes, you can double-click into
3:12them and start deleting certain elements
3:15or moving certain cupboards or hobs or
3:18sinks around to kind of fit your layout
3:21as you please. Alternatively, and this
3:23is where it gets pretty exciting, if you
3:25have a particular block, like a piece of
3:28furniture, in this case this bright
3:29orange sofa that caught my eye, you can
3:32bring it into the software, you can then
3:33do a generative AI block. So, you use a
3:37tool called generate product, which
3:39you'll see you can select the image, you
3:40can use selected image using the AI
3:42panel, head down to tools, select
3:45generate products, and you'll see it
3:47will create a block of that image. So,
3:49it will generate a three-sided block,
3:52top-down, side, and front view of that
3:55particular sofa, and it will also
3:57generate it to scale, which is really
3:59impressive. And you can see here we've
4:01got this this sofa now in our workspace,
4:04which we can pull into our drawings and
4:06have them across our floor plan sections
4:08and elevations, and they will all align
4:10and read together. You can also import
4:12DWGs at scale or generate a block using
4:15AI if you need something custom. Correct
4:17proportions instantly make drawings feel
4:19more professional.
4:22The second mistake which often leads
4:23from poor CAD block proportions are
4:26inefficient layouts. Rooms that almost
4:28work, circulation spaces that feel
4:30awkward, spaces that don't feel
4:31proportionate. To take this layout as an
4:34example, we're going to start dissecting
4:35this and make it a little bit more
4:37efficient. Now, you can see here the way
4:39that this is composed that you have this
4:40bedroom on the left-hand side, which
4:42doesn't really work too well next to
4:44this window.
4:45And then you've got the kitchen unit on
4:46the right-hand side, which isn't awful,
4:49but I think it could be rearranged
4:50slightly better where you have a bit
4:52more privacy in the bedroom. Currently,
4:54that bedroom is quite exposed to that
4:57kitchen living space, and it's right
4:58next to the front door, which isn't
4:59ideal. We could also use this long back
5:02wall for some storage. We could build in
5:04some storage here with some wardrobes
5:06and maybe a feature to the living space.
5:08So, potentially, I think we could swap
5:10around the bedroom and the kitchen to
5:12make it a little bit more of a an
5:14efficient space. And then what we could
5:16have as a feature, we could have a kind
5:17of a semi-permeable
5:19barrier that creates some kind of
5:21privacy between the bedroom and living
5:23space.
5:25So, if we pull the bedroom up to this
5:27corner here,
5:28um and swivel this kitchen round into
5:30this corner, then we can have
5:32potentially that
5:33window above the kitchen unit, so above
5:36the sink. We then bring the door around
5:38here so you can access the door uh the
5:40bathroom off the bedroom,
5:43and pull these wardrobes away, so And
5:45maybe we can have
5:46a low-level wall with um some kind of
5:49seating in that kitchen space. You're
5:52kind of compartmentalizing that kitchen
5:54space as its own as its own space with
5:57then a division here for the living and
6:00sleeping area.
6:02Now pulling the sofa back into this
6:03corner, we could then have some storage
6:05that runs along this back wall as I've
6:07mentioned. And then these wardrobes
6:09could almost become a semi-permeable
6:12barrier or
6:14kind of privacy space between the
6:16bedroom and the living space so that you
6:18can have maybe a TV along here. We could
6:20pull that wall out a little bit further
6:21to give more privacy to the bedroom as
6:24you can see here.
6:26And this now works a little bit better
6:27where we have essentially a living space
6:30with the outdoor seating area adjacent
6:32to it with then the kitchen space having
6:34its own area. And then you have a
6:36bedroom that's kind of partitioned off
6:39semi-partitioned off with those
6:41wardrobes.
6:42So it feels a little bit more efficient
6:44and a much more improved layout. And
6:47zones are especially useful here. They
6:48help you to see what's oversized, what's
6:50tight, and what needs adjusting. And the
6:53key takeaway is that layouts should
6:54evolve quickly and not feel painful to
6:57change. In Rayon, you can move, rotate,
6:59cut, and edit walls and layouts super
7:02easily as you've seen.
7:05A lot of drawings fail not because of
7:07design but because they're hard to read.
7:10Everything looks the same. Line weight,
7:12materials aren't clear, hierarchy is
7:14missing. This usually happens because
7:16styling is separate from drafting. In
7:18Rayon, drafting and styling happen
7:20together using the style panel. Take
7:22this floor plan. I know that we've
7:23exaggerated the line weights a little
7:25bit here just to show as a demonstration
7:27but you can see here that the the blocks
7:30are much stronger in the drawing and we
7:31need to find a balance between the
7:33walls, the furniture, the the hatches
7:35and textures in the background to make
7:38sure that the drawing is structured
7:40properly. Now in this case, we want to
7:42we want to bring down the intensity of
7:44the blocks. We want to increase the
7:45thickness of the walls. To take this
7:48block, for example, you can double-click
7:49into it.
7:50You can select the item, and you'll have
7:52a style here on the right-hand side,
7:54which you can edit. And we're going to
7:55bring that right down to 0.2, so it's
7:58much, much softer in the drawing, even
8:00though it's still got a little bit of a
8:01darker edge, a thicker edge around the
8:03block.
8:04And we'll do the same here with this
8:06block here. We can change that to 0.2 as
8:09well if we wanted to keep it consistent.
8:11And you'll see that it's changed some of
8:13the blocks across the drawing, and
8:15that's because that is a saved style
8:17that is applied to each of these blocks.
8:19So, if you change that style, it will
8:20change all of the blocks that have that
8:22style associated to it. Now, some of
8:24these details in the walls that show in
8:26the kind of wall build-ups, we're going
8:27to select these elements, and we're
8:29going to bring these down uh to maybe a
8:310.1
8:32because we want them to be nice and
8:34subtle in the background. We don't want
8:35it to be strong at all. And then we can
8:38take the walls themselves and increase
8:40the stroke to maybe a 0.3. I mean, you
8:43can test the different thicknesses here
8:44to try and get it right, but I think a
8:460.3 or maybe even slightly thicker could
8:49work well. And you can see here it's
8:50starting to give the structure to the
8:51drawing.
8:52Now, if there are other elements in your
8:54drawing that you want to select multiple
8:57of the same style, what you can do is
8:58you can select the element, you can
9:00right-click it, you can do select
9:02similar, same style, and you can see
9:04here all of those lines that we had that
9:06wall detail are now selected. I head
9:08over to the right-hand side here, we can
9:09then change that stroke to a 1-point a
9:120.1 to make sure that it's consistent
9:14throughout. And we can save that style
9:16by clicking save style and calling it
9:17the wall layer.
9:20We can do the same with zones and
9:22hatches that are applied to zones. If we
9:24select this floor finish here, we can
9:25adjust and drop the stroke to
9:28something quite light cuz you want it to
9:30make sure it's it's kind of in the
9:31background and not too strong, so maybe
9:3350% works well. Likewise with this style
9:35here, we could then change that down to
9:38also a 50% opacity. We can adjust the
9:41wall slightly further to a 0.5, so it's
9:44a little bit stronger. Likewise with
9:46these internal walls,
9:48and all of a sudden we have a much
9:50stronger hierarchy to the drawing where
9:52we have the elements that we're cutting
9:53through are much stronger. So, all of
9:55the wall elements that we're slicing
9:57through are much darker and thicker
10:00elements. We've then got a much softer
10:01elements in the background with the
10:03hatches that are a lot more subtle in
10:05the background. And then we have the the
10:07blocks, the furniture, that have a a 0.2
10:10surrounding, so that that's kind of the
10:12next hierarchy from the wall. So, you've
10:14got that structure and hierarchy to the
10:16drawing, where the drawing is now
10:17reading much more clearly and it's much
10:20better structured. Now, the finishing
10:22touch to this drawing, I think, is just
10:23going to be a bit of shadow. And in this
10:25case, we're just going to use the
10:26polyline to essentially draw a shape to
10:29indicate an area of shadow and maybe an
10:32area of where shadow's being casted in
10:34the floor plan.
10:35This will just be really simple and
10:36quite sketchy at this point, so we can
10:38simply draw this zone here and fill that
10:42with black,
10:43and then we'll drop the opacity right
10:45down to maybe even only 15%.
10:49Remove the stroke and there we have a
10:51bit of a shadow. And we can save that as
10:53a style, so that whenever we're building
10:55and adding any shadow to the floor plan,
10:56we can add that in. With a bit of work,
10:58you can arrive at something like this,
11:00which looks really great as a floor
11:02plan. The shadow adds that depth and
11:04that intrigue to the plan, a little bit
11:06more detail
11:07and three-dimensional quality. And now I
11:09think as a hierarchical drawing and a
11:11kind of composition with the line
11:12weights, it looks much better.
11:15And you can test styles live and save
11:17them in your style library. Good
11:19drawings aren't necessarily complicated,
11:21they're just intentional and clear. And
11:23you can see how you can manage that here
11:24in Rayon.
11:30>> drawing is is understood. Drawings
11:31should be annotated sufficiently so that
11:33anyone could pick them up and understand
11:35the detail. Where this can go wrong is
11:37if the annotations are not clear, not up
11:39to date, or the labels don't reflect the
11:41real information. Often the problem is
11:43that when you're jumping between
11:44softwares, there's two issues. You
11:46forget to update the text when drawings
11:48change. And number two is room areas
11:50change, but labels don't. And this leads
11:53to tags slowly becoming incorrect. Revit
11:56uses smart tags that stay linked to your
11:58drawings. And annotations that are not
12:00clear can look really messy. It can look
12:03something like this where you've got a
12:04really poor hierarchy. In some cases,
12:06we've over annotated this so the drawing
12:09looks too complicated and too confusing.
12:11And so this needs a little bit of work.
12:14Now the first thing that you can do is
12:15you can actually add annotations or
12:16build on your drawing if you'd like. You
12:18can add headers, leaders. You can add
12:20text. You can build into your
12:22annotations. And when you draw zones,
12:24you can have an automatic annotation
12:26added to that to indicate your square
12:28meter or square footage. You can also
12:31change the font of your text. You can
12:32make it much bolder or softer. And in
12:35this case, I think generally the text
12:37just needs to be managed slightly
12:39better. It's becoming too dominant in
12:40the drawing. So if I bring that down to
12:42a 0.1, this text now becomes much more
12:44of a
12:45um a kind of supplementary feature to
12:48your drawing, not the dominant thing. We
12:50can also adjust some of these titles
12:52here to bring it much smaller
12:55and centralize it a little bit better.
12:57Likewise with these annotations, if we
12:59double click into them, you can see that
13:00this text is probably
13:02ever so slightly too small, so we'll
13:03increase this to maybe 0.15
13:07and make sure it's centered. Now there's
13:09some of these texts like the built-in
13:12um wardrobe annotation and some of these
13:15elements here
13:16uh where you've got wall tags, door
13:18tags, and then you got a bit of a
13:19callout. This built-in cooker,
13:22we probably don't need those annotations
13:23for a drawing at this scale. And so
13:25there's certain elements that we can
13:26kind of pull out and adjust and amend.
13:29And then, double-clicking into any of
13:30these elements, you can start adjusting
13:31them and amending them. Now, in
13:33addition, you can also start customizing
13:34your annotations to start bringing that
13:36graphic style through the annotations.
13:39So, if we select this dimension, for
13:40example, we could select this element
13:42and change the color of that dimension
13:45text to red.
13:47And to give it a little bit of a red pop
13:49in our drawings, which looks, I think,
13:51really quite nice graphically.
13:53And so, you can see here now the drawing
13:54is much clearer, it's much cleaner.
13:57Uh we now have a consistency across the
13:59bathroom, kitchens, and studio spaces.
14:02And we can see here that you can also
14:03select on your zones and change the name
14:06of the zone, which has updated the name
14:09tag automatically. So, it's already
14:11automatically updating, it's live with
14:13your model. So, anything that you
14:15change, it will update live in your
14:16drawing.
14:17Likewise, if you wanted to push and pull
14:20some wall elements, you can see here, if
14:21you look at the the room tag, it's
14:23adjusting as you push and pull the wall,
14:26which is really great. So, it's live and
14:27working with your drawing.
14:29And we can do the same across all the
14:31other zones to make sure that they're
14:32all indicated as studio one, kitchen
14:35one, and bathroom one. Now, a benefit of
14:37these zones that you can start building
14:39in properties and building in the
14:40metadata into this particular zone. So,
14:43take this zone, for example, you can
14:45click then zone properties on the bottom
14:47right-hand side. And you can add your
14:49own categories. So, we can add maybe a
14:51property which indicates a floor finish,
14:54um which you can see here, you can
14:55change the type, you can change the
14:56format. If you wanted to add volume or
14:59area, for example, click save, and then
15:01we can type in a timber floor finish, if
15:03you wanted to. So, then now, all of a
15:05sudden, we have properties that are
15:06attached to that zone. And if we ever
15:08want to pull that information out in the
15:10table, it comes out with the drawing.
15:13Likewise with
15:14if we wanted to add a floor finish to
15:16the kitchen, we could do that as a a
15:18tiling. And you can obviously add your
15:20own particular type of tiling or
15:22whatever it might be, if it's a
15:23particular brand or if it's a particular
15:25scale or size.
15:27So now if we just head over and finish
15:29up this drawing by turning on our
15:30shadows, you can see that we have now a
15:33much better hierarchy to the drawing.
15:35The annotations don't feel too strong.
15:37They're supplementing the drawing,
15:38adding the detail required without
15:40overbearing and overtaking the drawing.
15:43And with that hint of red, I think it
15:44works really nicely as you can see on
15:46the dimensions. This means that your
15:48drawings stay accurate as they evolve.
15:50Less manual checking, fewer mistakes,
15:52more confidence in what you're
15:53presenting. I think that's really
15:55important. And of course, AI is now at
15:57the tip of everyone's tongues and it is
15:59now a mistake not to use it in my eyes.
16:04If you're not using AI in any of your
16:05workflow, you're making your life harder
16:07than it needs to be. But I must be
16:09clear, AI shouldn't replace design
16:11thinking, but it should absolutely
16:13support it. Now, the way that AI works
16:15in Rayon is through the AI chat on the
16:18panel on the left-hand side. If you open
16:20up the AI panel, you can see here that
16:22you've got various different options of
16:24adding your context. You can add a file
16:26or you can add a screenshot. In this
16:28case, let's add a screenshot of our
16:29space. We're just going to grab the
16:31floor plan, which you can see it drops
16:32into our prompt. You can then click any
16:35of these tools that are available to
16:36you. You could do image tracing, you
16:38could do axonometric, for example.
16:41And if we generate an axonometric,
16:43you'll be able to see how you can
16:44visualize the space in three dimensions.
16:46And as it thinks it through, it will
16:48create something really quite compelling
16:50like this. Which I think is really
16:53brilliant as a as a really kind of quick
16:55idea um ideation and a visualization
16:59tool to help you understand your space
17:01and how you're designing the space. You
17:02can then reuse that image. You can then
17:04maybe style that image into a clay
17:06model. I particularly like the clay
17:08model feature here.
17:09You can send that off and it will come
17:11out with something like this, which I
17:13think is a really great addition to a
17:15presentation set if you wanted to build
17:17your presentation set with some
17:18axonometric or some 3D views as part of
17:21your presentation. And if you wanted to
17:23include that particular image in your
17:24presentation, all you have to do is
17:26click insert image and it will bring it
17:28into your canvas. And then if you wanted
17:30to work into that image to add a bit
17:32more of your own style and your own
17:33touch and want to prompt it further, you
17:35can select that image, head to the panel
17:37again, use selected image, and then
17:40maybe let's prompt it to make it blue,
17:42for example, just as an example. And if
17:44you see here that it will come out and
17:45it will generate as blue as a particular
17:48style. Now if you wanted to, you could
17:50even just create a style of your floor
17:51plan. If you wanted to render it or if
17:53you wanted to create a sketch version of
17:55the floor plan. In this case, let's try
17:57and prompt it to render this floor plan
17:59and you'll be able to explore different
18:01material finishes, different floor
18:03finishes if you'd want. And if you see
18:05here that it creates something really
18:06quite compelling and it actually uses
18:08and includes your annotation as part of
18:10that. And so I think it shows, for
18:12example in this case, it shows lighting,
18:14it shows where light's coming into the
18:16room from the windows.
18:18And this is really compelling. The key
18:20is that AI lives inside the drawing
18:22environment. No exporting, no copy and
18:24pasting. It's fast, it's visual, and
18:27surprisingly powerful, as you've seen. I
18:29hope that by using these tools and
18:31workflows, these mistakes will no longer
18:33appear in your drawings, or at least
18:35reduce them. The key to architectural
18:37drawing in my eyes is this: clean
18:39layouts, correct scale, and clear
18:41graphics. They're very small changes,
18:44but a big difference. I've been using
18:46Round to solve these exact problems and
18:48it's completely changed how I draw and
18:50present work. You can explore Round for
18:52free by using the link in the
18:53description along with the access to the
18:55drawings used in this tutorial. Take
18:57what's useful, try it in your own
18:59workflow, and I'll see you in the next
19:01one.

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