Golden ratio around room size?

[puntloos]

(Mostly just @oldkettle and myself being curious)

 

Are there any golden rules of room width/depth/height that are known to produce good results?

 

Taken to some extremes we all understand a 1x25m room will feel less nice than 5x5m, and that a 2m60 ceiling will usually feel nicer than 2m25. 

But anything else? How high is too high for example? A 2x4m room that is 8m tall will probably feel iffy too.

 

Also there's some practical limits, the width of the room will influence how strong the roof above needs to be (metal beams?). Most standardized paneling is 2m40 so 2m60 will mean extra work and/or cost etc.

 

 

[freshy]

I've been thinking about this as well, and can't find any strict golden rules. I'm going to try to stick to square (ish) rooms where possible & height wise as you mention 2.4m is standard but based on what I have read I'm aiming for 2.7m on the ground floor at least.

[joe90]

Well I based my room widths on 4M (less carpet waste ?).

[Ferdinand]

I think this is mainly meaningful once you have a list of what you want the rooms for and how you intend to live.

 

Though I find that adding half a metre to once dimension adds more perceived space that might be expected, but that is in the context of contrasting to a normal practice. So eg a 4m x 4.5m lounge feels substantially spacious even compared to 4m x 4m, and you have something that is still a practical room once you have shelves or a desk at one side. Ditto 3 x 3.5m over 3m x 3m. Placig the door on the short side in that dimension may give a perceived extra size in a normal room as you are looking along something which you expect to be square rather than across it and your brain may assume a larger width too. Or it could work the other way ? .

Also think about using circulation routes as dual purpose eg have a breakfast bar backing onto it if you know that in general you will  not be sitting at the bar and wanting to walk past it at the same time.

 

Particularly if you want a room of 2 halves the Golden Radio may be a bit short and fat.

Remember that it has been used in design mainly for visual appeal when observed rather than utility for spaces to be experienced - which suggests more in proportions of your facade or garden rather than spaced to live in.

 

F

Edited August 18, 2020 by Ferdinand

[ProDave]

Re ceiling heights.  We have gone the other way. All downstairs rooms are a pretty standard 2440mm (just slightly over 2.4M so no need to trim any sheets of plasterboard) but upstairs, the two main bedrooms both have higher ceilings, the largest going right to the apex of the vaulted ceiling, with a mezanine platform over the small bedroom adjacent.

[puntloos]

On 18/08/2020 at 13:46, ProDave said:

Re ceiling heights.  We have gone the other way. All downstairs rooms are a pretty standard 2440mm (just slightly over 2.4M so no need to trim any sheets of plasterboard) but upstairs, the two main bedrooms both have higher ceilings, the largest going right to the apex of the vaulted ceiling, with a mezanine platform over the small bedroom adjacent.

That's pretty unusual. Normally you'd optimize for the places you spend most time (well, awake..) 

 

What was your rationale?

 

On 18/08/2020 at 13:22, Ferdinand said:

I think this is mainly meaningful once you have a list of what you want the rooms for and how you intend to live.

 

Though I find that adding half a metre to once dimension adds more perceived space that might be expected, but that is in the context of contrasting to a normal practice. So eg a 4m x 4.5m lounge feels substantially spacious even compared to 4m x 4m, and you have something that is still a practical room once you have shelves or a desk at one side. Ditto 3 x 3.5m over 3m x 3m. Placig the door on the short side in that dimension may give a perceived extra size in a normal room as you are looking along something which you expect to be square rather than across it and your brain may assume a larger width too. Or it could work the other way ? .

Also think about using circulation routes as dual purpose eg have a breakfast bar backing onto it if you know that in general you will  not be sitting at the bar and wanting to walk past it at the same time.

 

Particularly if you want a room of 2 halves the Golden Radio may be a bit short and fat.

So.. there IS a golden ratio? What is it?

 

On 18/08/2020 at 13:22, Ferdinand said:

Remember that it has been used in design mainly for visual appeal when observed rather than utility for spaces to be experienced - which suggests more in proportions of your facade or garden rather than spaced to live in.

 

 

[Ferdinand]

21 minutes ago, puntloos said:

That's pretty unusual. Normally you'd optimize for the places you spend most time (well, awake..) 

 

What was your rationale?

 

So.. there IS a golden ratio? What is it?

 

 

 

1.618.

 

I thought you were starting from that from the title ?. We did it in O Level Maths iirc.

 

It is the ratio of a rectangle with sides where the leftover bit has the same proportions as the original if you cut off a square. Draw it up and you see that that relationship lets you construct a decreasing series of rectangles where there long side of the next smaller one is the same length as the shorter side of the previous one, and that allows interesting progressions of shapes based around eg spirals.

 

Have a play with some graph paper and cutting up rectangles in that proportion - should give a better feel.

 

Mathematically you start with 1.618 by 1.

Cut off 1 and you get 1 by 0.618.

And 1 divided by 0.618 is 1.618.

 

Geometrically if you draw a rectangle like that, you can visually see a pair of simultaneous equations that let you calculate it.  

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

 

F

Edited August 22, 2020 by Ferdinand

[ProDave]

13 minutes ago, puntloos said:

That's pretty unusual. Normally you'd optimize for the places you spend most time (well, awake..) 

 

What was your rationale?

 

We had always planned for the larger bedroom to be open to the vaulted ceiling and the mezanine floor above the small bedroom.

 

The open design of the roof space allows so much flexibility so when it came to our bedroom, we decided to have a higher ceiling as we liked the look of the vaulted ceiling and it seemed a shame to hide most of unter a shandard height flat ceiling.

[Ferdinand]

The other structure like that that we all meet every day is the system of paper sizes.

 

Each size has half the area of the next size in the same ratio, and A0 the biggest has an area of 1 sqm.

 

It lets you eg auto-calculate in a spreadsheet the weights and therefore postage cost of letters just from the gsm of the writing paper and knowing that there are 16 A4s in a square metre. Minus the stamped envelope.

 

Basic knowledge for mailshot marketeers so they can annoy you at least expense ? .

 

But that works on the square root of two.

Edited August 22, 2020 by Ferdinand

[Oz07]

I've gone 2.55m in latest place (bottom trusses 2.7m, suspended ceiling below this with a 150mm gap in the middle. Just what worked best with the buildup I went with but the extra 6" does feel better than 2.4m. I wouldn't let the wastage on a 2.7m plasterboard dictate my ceiling height as it's pennies in the grand scheme.

[Bozza]

I have made a schoolboy error with my living room.  It’s 5m x 5.1m, but with floor to ceiling window reveal maybes 20cm wider on two walls.  Plus into the doorway opening. Result being that I can’t put carpet in it unless unless I get a carpet seamed or a bespoke carpet which will be an obscene price.

 

For carpeted room as mentioned before remember carpets are 4m as mentioned, or 5m.  Also think about if you have a room 4.1m x 4.1m .  Means you’ll need to use a 5m carpet.  Obviously off cuts can be used elsewhere cupboards etc but just something to consider with room sizes.   For super efficiency I suppose you could design room sizes based upon carpet sizes but that would probably not be your main priority !  

Edited August 23, 2020 by Bozza

[joe90]

1 hour ago, Bozza said:

you could design room sizes based upon carpet sizes

That’s what I did on our build!. On a previous house we had window reveals past the 4M mark and rather than fork out fir 5m carpet the fitter glued (special heat glued tape) off cuts in the reveal, it was impossible to see the join, the fitter even made sure the pile was in the same direction.

[Bozza]

1 minute ago, joe90 said:

That’s what I did on our build!. On a previous house we had window reveals past the 4M mark and rather than fork out fir 5m carpet the fitter glued (special heat glued tape) off cuts in the reveal, it was impossible to see the join, the fitter even made sure the pile was in the same direction.

Oh that’s very interesting Joe90. When I spoke to numerous carpet fitters, none of them would guarantee a seam could be hidden, so that really put us off looking at having a carpet which would definitely be our preferred option in our living room, especially as the join would be at the window recesses.  Do you remember what type of carpet it was eg poly, twist etc I suspect some types are better than others for seaming.

[Ferdinand]

2 hours ago, Bozza said:

I have made a schoolboy error with my living room.  It’s 5m x 5.1m, but with floor to ceiling window reveal maybes 20cm wider on two walls.  Plus into the doorway opening. Result being that I can’t put carpet in it unless unless I get a carpet seamed or a bespoke carpet which will be an obscene price.

 

For carpeted room as mentioned before remember carpets are 4m as mentioned, or 5m.  Also think about if you have a room 4.1m x 4.1m .  Means you’ll need to use a 5m carpet.  Obviously off cuts can be used elsewhere cupboards etc but just something to consider with room sizes.   For super efficiency I suppose you could design room sizes based upon carpet sizes but that would probably not be your main priority !  

 

Why not make a feature of the reveal or threshold in something else?

 

The last set of doors I did I put down a piece of varnished Sapele. Not expensive.

 

And yo7 can turn it over later like your grandfather’s doorstep.

 

 

Edited August 23, 2020 by Ferdinand

[Bozza]

16 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

 

Why not make a feature of the reveal or threshold in something else?

 

The last set of doors I did I put down a piece of varnished Sapele. Not expensive.

 

And yo7 can turn it over later like your grandfather’s doorstep.

 

 

That suggestion has potential for the windows thanks Ferdinand.  It’s quite difficult to see from attached pic but the frames go really low to floor level.  Oak skirtings to go in so and grey frames.  I could see if I could put in a reveal depth Low level oak strip / ledge that may look ok.  That plus the skirting thickness might just get me under 5000mm but I think fitters need more to turn under at the end.

 

[joe90]

2 hours ago, Bozza said:

Do you remember what type of carpet it was

sorry no, it was years ago . I don’t think anyone will “guarantee “ it won’t be seen but I remember being very impressed and I could not see it (and I am a fussy bugger). I also remember (even more years ago) working in a hotel where the carpet came in 2m widths and they hand sewed the strips together to make one huge carpet fir the dining room and the joins could not be seen at all.

Edited August 23, 2020 by joe90

[puntloos]

17 hours ago, Ferdinand said:

 

1.618.

 

I thought you were starting from that from the title ?. We did it in O Level Maths iirc.

 

It is the ratio of a rectangle with sides where the leftover bit has the same proportions as the original if you cut off a square. Draw it up and you see that that relationship lets you construct a decreasing series of rectangles where there long side of the next smaller one is the same length as the shorter side of the previous one, and that allows interesting progressions of shapes based around eg spirals.

 

Have a play with some graph paper and cutting up rectangles in that proportion - should give a better feel.

 

Mathematically you start with 1.618 by 1.

Cut off 1 and you get 1 by 0.618.

And 1 divided by 0.618 is 1.618.

 

Geometrically if you draw a rectangle like that, you can visually see a pair of simultaneous equations that let you calculate it.  

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

Ha yes, I know the ratio from math/nature/mandelbrot, I just.. with my topic at least - kind of meant to imply (or at least question) that there's a different GR for room dimensions.

Also not quite sure how the simplest form, in 3D, works. 

 

My livingroom currently is 7.5 x 4.9 (doh, close, GR would be 7.5 x 4.6) but then.. how high would the ceiling be? 

[Ferdinand]

47 minutes ago, puntloos said:

Ha yes, I know the ratio from math/nature/mandelbrot, I just.. with my topic at least - kind of meant to imply (or at least question) that there's a different GR for room dimensions.

Also not quite sure how the simplest form, in 3D, works. 

 

My livingroom currently is 7.5 x 4.9 (doh, close, GR would be 7.5 x 4.6) but then.. how high would the ceiling be? 

 

Were I to apply the ratio in a modern house design, I think it would be to things I look at.

 

eg proportions height:width of atria or windows, or maybe double doors. Or the ballroom !

 

Bit more detail here, albeit with added kartoffel:

 

https://www.mymove.com/home-inspiration/decoration-design-ideas/how-architects-take-advantage-of-the-golden-ratio/

 

F

Edited August 23, 2020 by Ferdinand