Rectangles to Spaces, Spaces to Walls

There are a number of ways one can prepare a design in VectorWorks. This lesson describes one way, which uses rectangles or other polygons to represent the building spaces. (Another method is by using a Grid, of which more on another occasion.)

Copy-paste the squares you created in the Fibonnacci exercise into a new file.

For convenience, use the template you created that is preset to offer a large drawing area at 1:50, in Feet & Inches.

Opt-drag duplicates of the 8' x8' and 13' x 13' squares off to the side.

Then, with the Selection tool, drag the duplicate 13' x 13' square by its Bottom Center point to the Top Center of the 8' x 8' square.

Draw in "fill-in" rectangles connecting the bottom corners of the two squares.

Opt-drag a duplicate of the 13x13 square to the Bottom Left of the 8x8 square

Then, with the Obj Info palette, resize it by one of its bottom handles to measure 8' vertically, rather than 13'

Create the remaining rectangles as per the layout shown.

Give them a slight tinted fill, to distinguish them from the background.

Create Spaces from the rectangles.

A "Space" in VectorWorks is a polygonal object that contains information about the space that it represents – including name, dimensions, height, surface finishes, etc. – all or some of which you can choose to display at any given moment. This menu command converts ordinary, "dumb" polygons into such Spaces.

Change its display to "Name Only"

A dialog appears asking what information about the Spaces you wish to display. Change the default Name and Number to Name Only, as we have no room numbers in this case. The other options you can leave at their default settings, for now.

Give each Space a distinctive name.

The rectangles are now replaced with Spaces, all called Space Name, by default. Select each one in turn, and rename it by typing in something else in the Space Name field.

Name the spaces as shown.

Complete renaming all the spaces as shown.

Create Walls from Spaces.

Now that these room polygons are "Spaces" in the VectorWorks sense, we can use them to generate the walls automatically: simply choose AEC > Space Planning > Create Walls from Spaces…

Create Walls from Spaces dialog

Before it creates the walls for you, VectorWorks asks you to give further information:
• Source Layer, Destination Layer: Do you want the resulting walls to be placed on the same Design Layer (in this case, the one called "Spaces"), or on another Layer (click on the popdown to choose another – or specify a new one);
NOTE: This is not really necessary, nor particularly recommended: better to assign them to a special Class for Space objects, one called, say, A-SPACES.
• Place Exterior Walls: Should the exterior walls straddle the centreline of the exterior Space boundaries (the default setting) – or should their inner face of the walls be placed there, or their outer face?
• Exterior Wall Style, Interior Wall Style: choose from dozens of readymade wall styles to replace the generic 6" or 150mm wall that would be used by default. In this case, we're choosing Ext-2x6-Brick veneer for the exterior walls, and Int-2x4-Gyp Bd 1/2" for the interior ones.
• Constrain straight walls to vertical or horizontal: this will "forgive" any instances where the Space lines are not quite horizontal or vertical – within a number of degrees of your choosing – to create truly horizontal or vertical walls
• Combine colinear interior walls: VectorWorks doesn't like wall segments that meet together "head-on" on the same line, so it offers to combine such segments, should they arise from the space layout, into single runs. This default setting is recommended.

Resulting wall layout.

The result – after assigning the Space objects to a Class of their own and setting it to Grey [1] – is as shown.

Zoom in to examine wall composition, join "X" junctions.

NOTE: There are often issues with interior walls not being flush with exterior walls at certain corners, as a result of this operation. To fix this, see