HGTV Home & Landscape Platinum Suite Software Review: Designing Your Home

In the post, Home Handy Software Review: HGTV Home & Landscape Platinum Suite, I said I’d be back with more info. First I thought we’d look at the home design feature.

You can design a house from scratch, but the software offers an easier option as well, the House Builder Wizard. It basically walks you through the process, allowing you to choose things like…

• Number of floors
• Foundation type
• House shape
• Garage position (or no garage)
• Building dimensions, which also calculates square footage for you
• Building elements, such as roof pitch, how thick you’d like your walls, footing size and so on

I used the wizard and here’s my basic house structure:

Nothing fancy, but this is before adding any doors, windows, etc.

So then I added some stuff….

You can choose from all sorts of windows, doors, plants, trees, and decks. Here’s what I added:

As you can see I added doors, windows, (kept it simple), decks, redwoods and lots of other trees; actually I choose trees that don’t really represent one specific area, but I like trees, so I was messing around. Then in the bottom right corner, I added gravel, and a purple herb and small rose garden. You can’t see it in this image, but I even added a tire swing in one of the trees.

Problems I had…

For some reason I had major issues figuring out how to edit or delete stuff. To make this easy for you, I cropped an image that will show you where to be if you need to edit.

In the top left hand toolbar, you click on that first arrow you see, under “building”, and then click on the item you want to edit.

I also had major deck issues. It’s not totally easy to drag your deck to the desired size and shape. With practice, I’m thinking it gets better. As you may have noticed, I added an upper story door, but there’s no deck. I can’t figure out how to add a second story deck, one attached to the house. I tried some stuff, but not extensively, so I’ll have to address this later.

Overall I think…

It’s really fun to plan your home design. It’s like total stress free time – just planning your house and garden. For me it was relaxing. I also played around with the build from scratch house, and that’s cool as well, although, the wizard is easier if you don’t know many building terms. I love the landscaping capabilities, and the choices of what to add are seriously endless. Lighting, fences, mailboxes, and so much more. Even in ground sprinklers, hammocks, and swimming pools. You can totally plan a bling yard with this software. I found all my favorite plants and trees. I’m not a shrub fan, but that’s available too.

I think the downside is the drag feature, i.e. for decks, gravel, and other items. It’s a little testy, but as noted, I haven’t extensively practiced using this software.

Oh – I should also add, that the image of my house above is not the only view available. It’s simple to pan around your house, and of course, add features in all dimensions and on all sides.

Next up, we’ll see if I can make the interior features work, and I’ll be giving you an overview score for this software as a whole. To learn more right now, head over to the homepage for the HGTV Home & Landscape Platinum Suite.

What do you think so far – does this software look handy to you?