
This week, a team of students at The Design Institute of Texas (DIT) will share their own creative take on what it takes to create a home from scratch.
Their design, called SketchUp, is a home design exercise that asks students to create an interior design style based on their own interests.
In an online Q&A session, the team shared their tips and tricks to making the home their own.
“There’s a certain amount of time that you have to think through, and if you can, then you have a lot of time to work on it,” said design student Josh Strain, one of the DIT team.
The design challenge was inspired by an interview Strain and his friend, Austin resident Ryan Kays, did with design magazine Design Inspiration.
“They’re asking a question, what do you think of a house that’s made out of wood, and it’s sort of a blank canvas,” Strain said.
Strain, who is currently enrolled in a Master of Design in Architecture program at Texas Tech University, said he was inspired to create SketchUp because he was searching for a new way to think about how to design a home.
“I was just trying to figure out how to make a home out of whatever material I could get my hands on,” he said.
“I was like, well, what can I do that doesn’t involve wood?
It’s the same with the architecture question.”
Strain said he’s now planning to complete the design and put it on display at the Design Institute next year.
As a student at DIT, he’s taking an interactive approach to design by creating sketchup designs on a computer, which he then uploads to his own sketchup website.
“This is kind of a more serious kind of approach, I think, than just designing things and going, ‘Oh, there’s a wall,'” Strain explained.
It’s a process he’s been using to develop his own style of design, but he said he thinks his design can help other students as well.
“It’s definitely a different way of looking at things,” he told ABC News.
“You’re kind of able to explore a whole different set of ideas, and hopefully you’re able to build a portfolio and do your own projects.”
What it comes down to is, I want to get my portfolio out there, and be able to see it and tell my peers, ‘I’m really good at this,'” Stain said.”
If you look at the work of a lot, I’d say that’s really good.
It’s just that sometimes I just don’t feel like it’s a good fit, because I don’t think it’s really something that I really understand,” he added.