Explore the workings of a material legend in architectural plans and understand how it provides information about the base material, wall, ceiling, and floor of a room. Also, learn how keynotes in a project remain consistent across all types of plans, simplifying the construction process as codes represent specific elements.
Key Insights
- The material legend in building documents provides detailed information about the components of a structure, including the floor, base material, walls, and ceiling. For instance, a symbol like 'SP' might indicate carpet on the floor, while 'W' represents wood.
- Specific materials are used in different areas depending on their function and environmental requirements. For example, Humidity Resistant Gypsum Board is used in spaces prone to water to prevent the formation of mold.
- Keynotes in building projects maintain consistency across various plans. Regardless of the unit in focus, the same keynotes are used, allowing for easy interpretation by contractors. For instance, a code like '20' could always represent a specific element like Bimilo blinds.
You'll notice that I have this interesting matrix on the floors of the rooms. So let's go to the right and see what this is all about. This is my material legend.
In the material legend, I'm identifying the floor, the base material, and what's on the walls and ceiling. For example, as we can see right here in the family room—the first one—the SP symbol is used. This tells me that in the family room, the floor material is SP, which stands for carpet.
The base molding at the wall is wood. I have a "W" here for wood. I'm showing wood over here as well.
I'm also showing that the wall—the third symbol—is gypsum. So this is 5/8-inch gypsum, and the ceiling is also gypsum. Now, let's go to the bathroom for a moment.
You'll notice that in the bathroom, the call is GW and GW. Let's go back, and you'll see that GW stands for Humidity-Resistant Gypsum Board. When we have spaces prone to water, we use a different type of gypsum board than standard because we don't want mold to form or similar issues.
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This, again, is the finished material legend. I'm going to go back a little bit. You can see our list of notes—everything is detailed here. One interesting thing is that in this set of building documents, as I mentioned before, we had eight different house models.
The keynotes in this project were consistent across all plan types. So, regardless of whether it was Unit One, Unit Two, Unit Three, or Unit Four, I would have the same keynotes listed on all my plans. When the Contractor was reviewing the plans, he could say, “Oh, this is code 20.”
When I see code 20, I know it's always going to mean Bimilo blinds, and so on and so forth. Let's go back a little bit. So, let's return to the house.
We have the dimensions. Again, we have our building section indicators. I have a building section that starts here, and the section ends down here.
If I zoom into this area, you can see that this is Building Section 1. Again, the page we're on right now is sheet A1-0. I will see the building section in image 1 on sheet A1-1, and we'll be going there in a few more minutes.
Again, you can see that we have dimensions. We have the calls for the building sections. Here in the family room, for example, I have an interior elevation.
This elevation will be image 7, Elevation A, on sheet A1-3. The first appearance of this interior elevation is in sheet A1-0. We have the plans.
We have the dimensions. We have the building section calls. We have hexagons that are being used for the window symbols.
We have circles that are being used for the door symbols. We have our material information calls finalized. And there we have our lower floor plan.