Building your own 'dream house'

[Decima]

It's something we've all probably done.

Anyone else actually find it a lot harder than doing other houses? I feel almost like I have more pressure to get everything 'perfect'. Unlike with other houses I guess I imagine living there myself and then have all sorts of problems like 'wouldn't I get annoyed having to walk around that kitchen island' etc.

Have you built your dream house and are completely happy with it? Would it be the house you'd build for real if you were going to build your own house?

In the UK there's a TV series called Grand Designs. I've watched it since forever and there's a new series starting this week. It features people that have built their own 'unique' houses. It's inspiring me to try to build a blueprint in the Sims for an actual house I'd like to build and live in myself.

[Katie123urgreat]

Sometimes I just look at some of the Sims houses and I wish I could live in them myself. I think we all have. I think you should draw it out first on a piece of paper and then transfer it onto the Sims to see it in 3D. But, if you were to personally live n those houses in real life, I think an architect is the best way to go. Look at house plans, they give me inspiration for my builds, and would give you inspiration as well. Here's a link: http://www.houseplans.com/
I LOVE Grand Designs! So interesting, and funny when they always get out of budget. 

[donatello]

You know, if you build your dream house, in 5 years it will be just your house, because the novelty wears off. I've built tons of houses I'd consider my dream house at one stage or the other, and the more celestial concepts for dream houses just fall flat on their face at my first thought of practicality. I think the perfect dream house really doesn't exist and the closest you'll get to it is replicating the FEELING of it into the most practical house you can come up with. Then after a few years it is more likely to actuall grow on you, given a regular dose of minor remodeling.

[xFezIsAFreakx]

My dreamhouse is more or less the house my Legacy sims live in. Modern, huge, lots of landscaping and lots of red. Overpriced. Blabla. I agree with Donatello in that it does change. I think when I'm older and have my own place I'll try and make it as modern as I can - I'm one of those people that like having a lot of modern art on canvases up. I'd have a lot of that sort of thing with red as it's main colour, like all the London-themed modern art and the Union Jack stuff that seems to be the craze at the moment. I'd also have a lot of band art. Those things are kind of hard to get in sims, so if I was to ever try to build a dreamhouse for myself rather than having it centred around my legacy sims, I don't think I'd be able to do it properly because everything I'd have is all stuff that's really personalised and pretty hard to find without having to opt for the use of Custom Content. Then there's also the problem that I can't build for my life..

[Wai]

I'm an old wrinkly of the gaming world.  However, I have a little cottage with a thatched roof which I play for most of my sims, it's small, tidy, attractive to look at and exactly what I would have for myself if I could.  Only thing I would add which is not available in the Sim's is rambling roses around the door and I would deffinately have chimney's which match my house walls, red brick is monsterous with thatching and natural stone.  I have to be honest, though I am not a architect, in the distant past, I designed and built a couple of houses for real, perhaps the studying I did before doing the plans for those helped me disign my sim house too.

[Wiry]

I could never live in any house I designed for my Sims, and My sims couldn't live in any house I would. My sims need massive spaces for small things, and I just don't like huge houses. What if I lost my pen? I'd NEVER find it 

[Wai]

Wiry, just how big do you make your sim houses?  I always keep mine small.  Usually no more than 12 by 16.  The cottage i use as mentioned above is this size.  It has three downstairs rooms, a hall plus a bathroom/utility room.  Two cozy dormer rooms with ensuites and a basement.  The Sims have plenty of room, the double width stairways ensure that they don't get blocked and are I admit, rather wider than I would need in RL.  By keeping rooms small many items can be placed aginst the walls, just as you would in real life and thereby they take up less room.  I admit that toddler toys are a nightmare in this layout, if my sims have babies, they get one learning toy at a time, or I take them to use the toys in the library and as soon as they have got all the skills they can i buy them a birthday cake.  I hate the toddler stange anyway.

[Wiry]

Currently my legacy house is a massive three story rectangle that takes up (Lengthwise) Most of the big 64 x 64 lot in Starlight Shores. I will admit I'm only good at decorating homes, not building them. My former legacy house in Twinbrook was a huge rectangle on a 60 x 60 that took up four stories up and one down. 

I do have most stuff pushed up against walls, but somehow everything seems to get full anyway    I'm not space efficient 

[donatello]

Wiry, how on earth do yo struggle for space in 5 levels of building? Seriously, it is astonishing. But yeah... I guess you have far more stuff to put in than I do (I have only WA and Ambitions EPs). Then again... If you have massive collections all in display cases and museums displaying every single thing you ever sculpted or invented or painted, not to mention a full garage of all cars in the game, you may end up killing 9 levels of 62x62. Though I have yet to max my collecting skill. Or have that many cars or sculptures or paintings. In short, you are obviously centuries ahead of me in gameplay. I'd gladly build for you if you'd like though. Did a few houses recently and they fetch good comments from those who asked me to build something for them.

[Wiry]

  I'm happy having my sims live in the houses I build though, It makes it easy to see everything and select it all. I myself however, wouldn't be able to live in them because i lose things 

[donatello]

Cool. By the way, your signature has me in stiches more often than you'd believe, lol!