Building TutorialSuburban homeMy first serious topic.FOREWORDPLEASE NOTE: I am not trying to act superior with this tutorial.
I am simply telling you how you COULD build a house in Blockland. Not how you HAVE to build.This idea has been stuck in my mind for months. I've been practically talking to myself while I've been building just
to practise how a tutorial would work. It's been a bit of a struggle to find the right words for my brickstuffting
(I'm not going to blame my Swedish location for that, but rather my laziness on the English classes), but I might
say that I'm pleased with the result and on a further note also hope the reader will be.
PURPOSEI'm normally a huge critic when it comes down to judging other builds and would like to point out that it is not
because I enjoy rubbing the faults in the creator's face. I am simply being negative because I'm not pleased with what
I see and so on would like to help out. I rather want people to improve than just giving them useless compliments.
Thereby this idea was planted in my mind, because of my failure to bring forth gentle criticism in ordinary gallery
topics. This tutorial is my way to help out and give advice. It may be totally useless for some and the opposit for
others, but I still think that everyone could bring atleast something useful from this topic.
SYNOPSISThis tutorial will show you how to make a simple Suburban home (if that is the right term for this kind of house)
from the foundation to the roof. It points out several ways to make your building easier and gives you
valuable/worthless advice to improve your standards. The topic contains a save of the house for further deepening and
for those who just want to abuse it for an other cause. Note that the house contains no events at all if you're going
to download it, thus this is a building tutorial and events can be added by the downloader if he/she so wishes.
Once again, please note that this tutorial is just showing my own opinion and my ways of building. It is not superior in any way.TUTORIALpicbomb1. If you're going to build a simple house I would suggest making the road first so you have something to start out from. A suburban home does not look right without a road. It does not have to be advanced in any way.
2. Decide how big space you need for the house. Have in mind that the garden, driveway and other outdoor essentials should fit. Make sure that the last baseplate you put is one step below the sidewalk so the (for example) driveway you'll put is on the same level as the sidewalk. This is very important. A driveway that is one step above the sidewalk is not acceptable in my opinion.
3. Make a plan of the shape of the bottom floor. The very first thing you'll have to think about when you start making the shape of the house is how the roof will be arranged. I've done the mistake many times that I've made a great building, but when it comes down to finishing it I have no idea how the roof should be because the shape of the house is such a mess. This time I've planned the shape of the roof already (as you can see), so all I have to do is make walls up to the roof.
4. To have a little variety I've decided to have the ground floor in different heights. The garage will have the same level as the sidewalk, the front door will have 2 bricks up and the back door 1 brick up. This is the foundation of the house. The grey is like concrete or something.
5. Measure how big the garage should be. Try spawning a vehicle and see if it fits. The front door is put deeper into the build which also gives the build more variety.
6. Make the garage door and a frame for it. Tophius' windows suits well for this purpose. I usually make my garage doors with bricks only, the stripe look gives it the ability to be rolled up in a container. The ramps on the frame gives the house another edge.
7. Do the way up to the front door first. I usually try to make the steps 2 plates high because it fits the height of the blockhead better. A more realistic and nicer looking height for steps. Make terrain and a ledge for the driveway to keep the grass out. This way it looks like the driveway been cut into the terrain. End the ledges with a small ramp for a smoother look. I also have to keep in mind that the terrain should end with a good height for the back door.
8. Fill in the inside with flooring and make rooms. I've decided to have an open plan (or whatever it is called) with kitchen, dining area and living room combined, because the size of the house doesn't allow so many rooms. Print plates are nice for the bathroom, but using prints outside it is completely unnecessary. Plan where you will put the stair so you won't block future windows with it. I've made a spot ready for the stair where there is an edge.
9. Time for some walls. You may have noticed that I'm not going to do an interior wall. That's because the white bricks I'm using fits well on the inside too and the size once again does not make interior walls appropriate. I'm only using bricks because I want a more plank style. This, I have taken from Mrc. The windows in the garage are put one brick into the concrete to blend the white and grey together. The front windows got ramps under them for more variety and the door into the garage got a window above it so the room doesn't feel completely blocked out from the others. I've added the ceiling for the front door.
10. I want to finish the garage part of the house as early as possible so I can have a better look at things and thus add the inner ceiling. I don't use any plates for the ceiling to avoid breaking the plank combo which is made by bricks. As you can see on the next image the ceiling points out one step. This was a decision I took after I've noticed that if I wanted the ceiling brick to end where the inner wall and outer wall was I was forced to use smaller bricks. That option I despised and thus I decided to have the ceiling point out one step and see how that would work out. The small room is separated from the others with an arch, because I found making a door for such small space would had looked silly.
11. This door also got a window above it to keep the house more open. The two new windows are 1 brick higher than the garage ones for a small variety.
12. The roof is built first. The bottom of it have the width of 3x and after that I uses 4x plates. I decided to have a 3x width at the end of the roof so it was both fatter there and more, sort of rounder. If anyone wonder what I'm talking about just give a shout and I'll try to explain it further. The roof is finished with a ramp crest which gives it a more solid look. After that, you'll just have to fill in what's between the roof and the ceiling.
13. Before I start making windows in these areas I have to check where I'm going to place the furnish such as bathtub, fridge, stove and toilet. These are marked out with white plates so I can avoid placing windows in unsuitable places. This use to happen to me more than you can ever guess when I was into The Sims. I made the whole exterior first and placed windows and then when it came down to furnish I placed the fridge, fire alarm or anything else inconvenient in front of the windows by accident.
14. Finished up the walls to the height where the ceiling will be put on and added windows for my own liking. Trying to keep a neutral look with the fireplace. However, the fireplace is an interior and thus it's a matter of taste.
15. Ceiling on. You can't see it from here but, the ceiling on the garage part is one brick lower than this ceiling. This also gives an effect of variety in the house. The steps of the staircase are 2x high for less steepness and is made with a pretty modern look. This way the room gets more air and you can place stuff under it without hiding them.
16. Plan the inner walls.
17. Finish the walls. The wall to the balcony is filled up with windows so it feels like the balcony is just an extension of your bedroom. The windows at the front are placed like eyes for symmetry and the two windows at each side of the chimney are placed with an even distance from it.
18. Finish up the roof just as the last time and finish the chimney. I use the panel bricks from "A random brickpack" to accomplish a shallow hole and the slanted bricks at the sides for a quite smoother edge.
19. And we're done.
InteriorsI'm not going through an interior tutorial and would then rather just give you some tips, my own way of doing furnish and of course these images.
I've begun to use ceiling prints whenever I got a flat ceiling. If you use big prints it doesn't take up that much of a bricks and it looks much more better than the ordinary look. When you're making a quite modern house it is crucial that you use matching colors. Colors are usually used when it comes down to textiles as sofas, beds and chairs. That's why most of my textiles got the theme blue and if you don't want to overuse the blue you use the brown-grey color which is very neutral. However I've made some exceptions in this build about the colors. When I make interiors I always try to make things as unsymmetrical as possible. For example, all the chairs at the dining table stands differently. At last, try to use as much green as possible inside.
I had interior images here before but decided to remove them because they caused me lag.Here is a
link to the album if anyone is interested.
IMAGESHere are some
Images I took in the dark with bulb lights instead of player lights. Much nicer light.
ADD-ONSI'm not 100% sure if all of these add-ons are in the save but it's not a loss if you download them anyway.
Colorset:Trueno's Colorset (old one)
Bricks:4x4f Ceiling Print brick
Ceiling Print Plates
Extra Ramps
Fence Bricks
Jirue's Bricks
One Random Brick Pack
Pole Bricks
Print Plates
Round Corner Bricks
Slanted Bricks
Wedge Bricks
Windows Brick Pack
Lights:Cityz Lights
Cars:TinyCar (optional)
CREDITSMrCookie: For being the main inspiration of the whole style the house is built with.
TopicPhydeoux: For his fridge style which I first got from him somewhere in 2009-10 and so on stuck with.
Redliub: For his balcony in Mrc's renovation contest, which was what I
first thought of after I had made the balcony on this house.
TopicTophius: For his bed style with a completely covering blanket and a great amount of pillows piled up.
SAVESadly I forgot to make a second save without the interior, for those who would like to practise their own furnishing,
so you'll have to stick with my furnish or take the time to demolish it.
SaveFUTUREIf this tutorial was appreciated I would like some suggestions of what a second one should contain and what I could
improve etc.
FinallyI would like to thank you for your time and I hope you've somewhat enjoyed my tutorial. This is not a gallery topic and thus you're not supposed to care about the building itself. I'll rather have you focused on the topic itself. If you have any questions or if something is not in order you could either pm me or write in this topic.
Cheers.. 
