The Interface Guide
If you find yourself looking at your screen confused as to what the buttons do, you have come to the right place! This page will outline what each thing in the A-Space interface does.
Last updated
If you find yourself looking at your screen confused as to what the buttons do, you have come to the right place! This page will outline what each thing in the A-Space interface does.
Last updated
When you create a new project, or if you open an existing project, you will arrive at A-Space's Design Interface. The interface is split into 4 sections:
This button takes you directly to the A-Space website - www.a-space.studio.
This button will always take you back to the previous screen. During the BETA, A-Space only has 3 screens: "Login", "My Projects" and this one (the design Interface). So the back button will currently always take you back to My Projects.
By default the title of the project will be the title of the DXF file you uploaded upon creating the project. To change the title, simply click on it. Clicking away from it will automatically save it.
At any point, as long as a generated layout is selected, this button can be pressed to Export the design back into DXF format and downloaded.
This button lets you navigate away from the current Design interface to access A-Space resources and other parts of the product.
This button will take you back to your projects, where you can create a new project or open a different existing project.
This button takes you to the page you are now on, where you can find guides, tips, tricks and video tutorials.
This will log you out of the application and take you back to the Login page
This button acts as a filter to display only the solutions you've bookmarked, making it easier to focus on the layouts you find most appealing. Use it to streamline your design exploration and view the layouts you consider to be the most promising.
Every time you successfully generate solutions, you create a group. This group holds all of the solutions generated together by a specific set of configurations. If you generate twice with exactly the same configurations, 2 separate folders will be created.
Click on this icon to bookmark a solution. Bookmarking allows you to keep track of solutions you liked and use thee "Bookmarks" filter to only view these.
Each solution can be deleted by clicking on the 3 dots, followed by the delete button. Clicking away will close the delete-popup.
If you don't want to click on each solution to see what it looks like, or you forgot which solution you liked, you can expand this panel to show each solution side by side. These solutions are simplified - they only show the rooms, without walls, doors, decorative or elements:
This button minimizes the solution panel.
A grid of dots is visible behind the Floor-Plan. This grid is spaced the same size as the scale bar.
This bar shows the dimensions of a specific length on the screen. As you zoom in/out of the plan this bar will update.
Depending on your zoom, the fixed length can be either 0.5m, 1m, 2m, 5m or 10m
This value is fixed and represents the “Net Floor-Plan area". This value excludes any bounding walls and windows, as well as internal structural walls.
Any additional geometry not part of the A-Space .dxf layers will be treated as decorative. Decorative geometries will be shown on the screen but cannot be interacted with.
The lighter geometry inside the kitchen is the kitchen counter.
To iterate on a solution, you can lock any rooms you like, to keep them the same when you generate new layouts:
Use this button to turn Off and On the room colours.
This button returns the floor-plan to the middle of the screen and resets the zoom.
Clicking on the “Metrics” tab will display key information and stats for the selected floor-plan. Until a solution has been generated and selected, the metrics panel will remain empty.
These are the type of rooms you can generate your layout with. The area of each room is automatically calculated each time you press generate based on the NFA of your project and all of the rooms you are generating your layout with. Each room has a minimum area, which is as follows:
Bedroom
12 m²
Livingroom
12 m²
Kitchen
5 m²
Bathroom
3 m²
Ensuite Bathroom
3 m²
Toilet
2 m²
Dining Room
10 m²
Study
5 m²
Storage Room
2 m²
These buttons allow you to control how many of reach room type you generate with. You can either use the “+” and “-” buttons or manually type in how many you want. Each room type has its own minimum and maximum room count:
Bedroom
1 - 4
Livingroom
1
Kitchen
1
Bathroom
0 - 3 (minimum 1 if Ensuite = 0)
Ensuite Bathroom
0 - 3 (minimum 1 if Ensuite = 0)
Toilet
0 - 1
Dining Room
0 - 1
Study
0 - 1
Storage Room
0 - 2
An Ensuite Bathroom is a Bathroom that is guaranteed to be attached to a bedroom. If you are trying to design an Ensuite Bedroom, click +1 Bedroom and +1 Ensuite Bathroom.
This is a separate room designated for dining. This room is always open onto either the Kitchen or Livingroom
Storage Room is like a Utility cupboard, it is larger than built-in storage and is accessed through a traditional door.
Not all room options are possible for every Floor-Plan. Every time you add/remove a room your Configurations are automatically checked to see if they will work. If they will not work, this box will turn red:
When this shows, you will be unable to generate layouts. This can be resolved by remove one or more rooms.
This occurs if the room count exceeds the floor-plan capacity, there are more bathrooms than bedrooms, or required rooms (Bedroom, Living Room, Kitchen, Bathroom/Ensuite) are not selected. The exception is when configuring a layout with a staircase—if you receive this message, please ignore it.
A-Space uses a variety of Ai models generate floor-plan layouts. Each model results in slightly different layout typologies. These buttons allow you to chose which model you wish to use to generate. The first generation on a new project will run all 3 models by default.
Clicking on the “Floor-Plan” tab will take you back to the "Controls" Panel. This is where you can change your selected rooms and generate more solutions.
This bar illustrates how the Net Floor Area (NFA) is distributed among different room type categories. The number on each bar indicates the percentage of NFA occupied by that specific category. When you select a room on the layout, the corresponding block on this bar will illuminate.
The black bar in the "Distribution %" bar shows how much of the NFA has been used for circulation and internal walls.
Layout efficiency represents how much of the layout is dedicated to inhabitable rooms. The more space taken up by walls and circulation, the lower this % will be.
This metric tells you the area of a room. By clicking on a room within the selected Layout, these numbers will show both the area in that specific room as well as the total area occupied by all rooms of that type. This is not to be confused with rooms in the same category - for instance, clicking on a bathroom will show the total area of "Bathrooms" not including any "Toilet" the layout may have.
This value provides an estimated cost for implementing the proposed renovation design. Unlike other metrics, it is an estimate derived from the property's Net Floor Area (NFA) multiplied by the cost per square meter. The cost is presented as a range, acknowledging the considerable variability in labor and material expenses, along with the inherent uncertainties associated with any renovation project. NB: Users are advised to treat this estimate as a general guide and are strongly encouraged to seek professional advice and obtain detailed quotes from qualified contractors before making any financial commitments.
Each section has different functions. All interface elements are annotated with a yellow number: . Anything annotated with a yellow number circled in RED is an experimental feature which is only visible to some users: . If you know what section you need help with, use the links bellow to jump straight there.
Click on a Group to open it and display its solutions. Clicking again will close it.
Bookmarks: (see )
Bookmark Solution: (see )
Solution Options: (see )
Close Compare View:
Click a Room to select it. When a room is selected its color becomes brighter .
If you like the exact shape and location of the room, click the “Lock/Unlock” button to keep it the same. If a room is locked, it will be marked with the relevant padlock. You can unlock it with the same button.
This tells you how many of each room type were used to generate this layout. The coloured dot along side each room type also acts as a key for the "Floor-Plan" panel - rooms are coloured by category: - Bedrooms - Bathrooms - Social Rooms - Service Rooms - Corridor NB: Bathrooms and Ensuite Bathrooms are counted together as "Bathroom / Ensuite".
