Introduction: How to Make a Sketchup Room

About: I have a wide variety of interests ranging from robotics to hiking. And that's all you should know.

This Instructable is all about how to create an amazing computer-assisted design room. I will be using Google (Trimble) Sketchup. Sketchup is a very limited tool but easy to use, and, it is free. You can download it here.
I have several goals for this room:
It must use real dimensions of my actual room
It must have unique furniture
It must have lots of books
It must have an area designated for designing and homework
It must have a place for my gecko's enclosure
It must be realistic to create
It must maintain a stream-lined industrial feel

Let's get started!

Step 1: The Floor Plan

The cut out space is where my closet is, if I ever feel moved to create my design in real life I don't want to risk having the roof cave in on me by breaking it down.
For this part of the model I exclusively used the rectangle tool (hotkey 'r'). I had previously measured the dimensions of my room to create an accurate floor plan. To exact my measurements I had typed in the little box at the bottom right hand corner of the screen the exact dimensions.

Step 2: Creating Depth

For this step I employed three tools; the push and pull tool, the line tool, and the select tool.
First I used push/pull (hotkey 'p') to raise all the sides up. Then the line tool (hotkey 'l') to create a solid space over the door, with a push/pull to give it depth.
A ceiling should form, if it doesn't, that is O.K, if it does, erase it. To erase something in Sketchup you need to press space to get the select tool, left click what you want to erase, then hit the delete key.

Step 3: The Bed

This is a relatively long and complicated step that use lots of different tools. Ultimately, I want to create a streamlined bed.

The 'legs'
This sub-step requires the push/pull, circle, arc, and follow me tool. The first thing I did was hit 'c' for the circle tool. Once I had created the circle I pulled it up a bit. Then I drew an arc that connect in tangent to the circle. Unfortunately there is no hotkey for the follow me tool (as of Sketchup 13) so I had to click 'tools' at the top of the screen and selected follow me from there. With the follow me tool in hand I left clicked, and held, the top of the cylinder and dragged it along the arc. Be patient with the follow me tool, it is rather finicky and easy to get annoyed by. And to make things easier for the rest of the build I selected the entire structure, (use the space key) and pressed 'g' for group. This keeps everything from grouping together. Next I copied and pasted it with CTRL C and CTRL V.

The other pair of legs uses identical techniques with one additional twist. After extruding the circle around the curve I created another cylinder with the exact same diameter and with the move tool (hotkey 'm') I positioned it inside the leg.

Now, with the tape tool (hotkey 't'), I measured out the distance in between each leg to make sure that the bed was even.

The boards
This is probably the simplest sub-step. I simply drew the rectangles, pushed them up to give them depth, and moved them into place.
The book shelf is also as simple.

Coloring
Click 'b' for the paint bucket. For the boards I used wood, charcoal black, and matte black. The legs are corrugated metal.

Step 4: Books!

I am a bookworm, that is why I added the bookshelf to my bed. But what is a bookshelf without books?

Two rectangles painted like wood will be the covers. I then drew a slightly smaller rectangle inside one of the covers. This rectangle is white. I push it to the other cover. To create the texture of pages I draw all the lines at irregular intervals across the rectangle. I also push/pull some of the pages to further the sense of roughness. And to cap it all off I drew two arcs to simulate the binding and pulled it to the edge.

Then I create several more books by copying and pasting. To make each book unique Make each book a group then scale it with the 's' key. Also I color each book slightly differently.

To stack the books as shown I also used the rotate tool (hotkey 'q') to rotate each book slightly on the blue axis.

Step 5: Trimming Up the Room

I fix up the closet, with the overhang, like I did with the doorway. The floor is wood, and, to create more of an industrial feel, I made the floor of the closet 'Metal_steel_textured.'

Step 6: A Work Table

I need a workspace for designing and homework because I fancy myself an engineer and I am a student. This part of my room shall address those two requirements. I want my workspace to look streamline and industrial at the exact same time.

The counter
I used a rectangular prism colored like glass to create a counter. As a single block I placed it in the corner of my room. Then I made a rectangle to mark out the area I wanted to extend out of the side of the counter. Then I pushed it out to the distance I wanted.

The braces
I used a series of arcs and lines to create the 2-d graphic I wanted to use as the brace. I then copied it for later use. Then I pushed the original brace out to the thickness I wanted it to be. I then took the sections I had previously copied and moved them into the model of the brace so I could color each part differently.
I copied and pasted and moved and rotated everything into position.

Step 7: Book Shelf

After a mostly streamlined bed and counter I felt like I needed a more industrial element next to balance everything out. I also needed a book shelf in my room too so an industrial book shelf was in order. This shelf doesn't employ many complicated build techniques but a lot of simple ones.

The blocks
This is pretty simple but time consuming. I made a cube, made four circles for each side, pushed the out a bit. Created a smaller circle inside of the ones I made. Deleted the center. And added an overhang for the top. From there I attached each piece together like legos to create the frame.

The shelves
To create the shelves I took some rectangular wood and cut out the corners. That simple.

Step 8: More Books

This step details exactly what step 4 does. The only difference is that I rotated the books around the green axis.

Step 9: Wall Sockets

As I use a lot of electricity to charge batteries and power computers I decided that it would be appropriate to add wall sockets to my design.

I used three different rectangles to form the main body. Two are parallel to each other to give the wall socket an 'edge.' The third rectangle is smaller than the other two and in front of them. I then used lines to connect the corners of the small rectangle the corners of the rectangle closest to it.
For the screw a small circle pushed just above the surface with a valley in it marked out by two lines will do. A similar technique is used for the actual plugs. A line slices the top and bottom off of the circle for each plug.

Step 10: Gecko's Home

One of my goals was to have a place for my gecko, here it is.

The stand
I just used the same parts I used on the bookshelf here. Everything snapped together easily. This helps add to the industrial feel of the room, and it goes well with the floor of the closet.

The enclosure
My gecko's home is simply made up of several rectangles so this part was relatively easy for me to accomplish. Once completed I placed a corner of the enclosure on the far left corner of the stand and moved the right side more right until everything was nice and snug.

Step 11: A Lamp

For this step I used the follow me tool to create the turns around the circles. Besides that everything is very straight forward.

Step 12: Another Lamp

This lamp uses the same basic strategies as my previous lamp did. I wanted this lamp to add a 'futuristic' zeal into my room, and, of course, to help me read at night.

Step 13: Yet Another Lamp

For those of you who happen to possess a leopard gecko you already know that they need a heat lamp to keep them warm. This lamp is for that purpose. Also, by surprise, this lamp looked pretty cool in the corner so I copied an pasted it so I could have two lamps.

This lamp does not use any special tools not mentioned under the instructions for the other lamps.

Step 14: Computer

As I do a lot of designing of robots I like using computers a lot. So it is natural that if I have a workspace in my room I also get a computer.

This step entails a lot of rectangles. There isn't really any need for me to explain where I put each rectangle. If you have any questions about this step you can just comment and I will reply as quickly as I can.

Step 15: Paper Holders

My workspace was feeling a little blank so I decided I needed to add something. Besides designing on computers I do a LOT of work on paper. A lot of the time I end up losing some really cool stuff because I am so disorganized. So in my dream bedroom I would need paper holders. Since these paper holders would go on my somewhat streamlined counter I decided I should make them look streamline.

The paper holders are just rectangles and arcs with some pushing and pulling- no advanced tools. The pictures show pretty much every single step I took.

Step 16: Dresser

I need a place to put my clothes so a dresser/wardrobe was in order. As there wasn't much space left in my room I had to put it in the closet. Since my closet was very industrial heavy I needed to make it industrial and as my gecko has already taken up half my closet it needed to be small. This reduced my options to an industrial 'cubby.'


I had already used a lot of the lego-like metal beams so I needed something fresh along the same lines. To tie my closet space into the rest of my room I used the same wood the books-shelves used. The bottom-most part is used for shoes, with holes to stop wet/muddy shoes dripping onto the floor, the middle part is for all my 'normal' attire. And the top beam is reserved for hanging dress shirts.

Step 17: Pencil Holder

Any self-respecting engineer or designer can tell you that they need to use pencils for their line of work. So do I. Instead of having pencils and pens sprawled out across the table I decided I will have pencil holders. To fit nicely on the desk I decided I needed a modestly streamline looking holder.

This is a very straightforward sequence. The pictures tell the whole story.

Step 18: Pencils

First I ask you, 'What is a bookshelf without books?' Now I ask you, 'What is a pencil holder without pencils?'

Most of the pencils at my house are hexagon-based. So I start out with a hexagon. To get a hexagon you click the tool to the right of the circle tool. If you selected the right tool then at the bottom of the right hand side of your screen you should see a box that says 'Sides' with a blank next to it. Just type '6.' Besides that everything is straightforward.

Step 19: A Window

All rooms need a window, at least mine does.

The hole
I just marked out where I wanted the window to be and made a hole. No muss, no fuss.

The frame
At this point the hole looks pretty ugly. In order to stay with the theme I decided that a simple metallic trim would be best. The trim is pretty simple to make and the pictures should tell you the whole story.

The glass
I just created a block and then painted it to look like glass. If you go to 'materials,' then 'translucent,' it should be right there.

Step 20: Scenery

Now that we have a window we should at least be able to see something out of it.

For the hills I just made some arcs that I colored green. The clouds are a lot of circles that intersected each other. All the lines inside of the border I deleted. hen I colored each cloud a slightly different shad of white.

Step 21: Light Switch

I almost forgot about this one. In order to see you need to be ale to turn on the lights!

I use the same basic techniques from the wall socket with an additional rotated rectangular prism.

Step 22: The Door

This door uses the same frame that the window uses to help tie the room together. Instead of a traditional doorway I went with a folding door. I believe that the door fits well with the lamps creating a 'triangle of ties.' The build for both of these is pretty simple.

Step 23: Finished!

Here is a time-lapse of the build. Please free feel to ask any questions, even if they are 'stupid.'

Improve Your Room Youth Design Challenge

Second Prize in the
Improve Your Room Youth Design Challenge