When I laid out my original store nearly eight years ago I used nothing but hand drawn sketches to render the final layout. Since then I’ve made changes and added new stores with design characteristics that work better for my business. I’d love to say I used nothing but a slide rule or abacus but that would be a little farfetched.
This past week I started the process of giving my Gardner location a much needed facelift. Being a techie guy one would figure everything I do would be computer based so repeating ideas would be a click away. My big dilemma came from picking color and layout schemes from other stores.
After returning to the store with a stack of paint chips, my paint contractor suggested I download an application for my phone and use it to record the color. With a few taps on my screen he downloaded an app that uses my cell phone’s camera to snap a picture and suggest a myriad of colors which may match. To my surprise, the color picked by my phone was a very close match.
For years I’ve used to use a pen and paper to layout how a room was going to look prior to moving the furniture into position. I guess I’m one of those who would rather draw something than boost large pieces. My brother noticed me sketching the room and suggested he use the free Google SketchUp software to mock up the new design. Within a matter of minutes he had the room laid out saving me dozens of pieces of paper and hours of time.
After finding the paint app for my phone I started perusing other software which could save time when designing or renovating a home. I found a ton of free utilities and some really low-cost software which might make the quest for ‘new’ that much easier and closer to reality. With the help of Google and my faint memory of home ownership, I’ll offer up some other fun pieces.
Kitchen cabinets are probably one of the more expensive updates a homeowner can make; and a mistake can cost thousands of dollars. Many companies produce kitchen design software and some cabinet manufacturers provide design utilities. Merillat, one of the largest cabinet manufacturers, provides a free web-based drawing utility that provides a bill of materials and schematic.
With the summer winding down most people aren’t thinking of starting landscape projects; after all, there’s hardly time to enjoy the fruits of our labor. Simply scanning Google search results for “free landscape software” I found some pretty nice looking utilities. The tool I’m playing with now allows me to add different trees, shrubs, and change the ground cover. I haven’t figured out the 3D portion of the software, but I’ll save that for another article.
As I was doing my prior search I stumbled on deck design software. Most of the titles look as though they’re provided by engineered decking manufacturers, but they still could prove interesting if used strictly for ideas. Deck materials come in different dimensions so it’s in the interest of specific manufacturers to provide their own custom software.
Software takes much of the tedium out of designing your space and making economical use of your time and energies. Using some of the free and low cost stuff I’ve thrown out can also cut down on material costs due to design efficiencies. The way I see it, the suggestion to use my phone app saved me at least an hour of running around. Let’s face it, unless you’re superhuman and can be in two places at one time, you probably won’t notice a slight color variance between my stores.
(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can call him directly at (978) 919-8059) or visit www.LocalComputerWiz.com.