It’s been a while since I’ve posted any new 3D models. Not that we haven’t been busy creating new ones, it’s just that in December an update to the Live Home 3D program introduced a bug along with the welcome new features.

The bug prevented me from creating the walkthrough videos. The programmers eventually solved the bug so I’m back to posting projects.

This house represents my dream Victorian, if I was independently wealthy and just had all the time in the world to enjoy my hobbies of gardening, photography, music, and motorcycles.

While I wanted to create a Victorian since we bought the program, I wasn’t sure if it was up to the task, as there was no easy way to create the gingerbread and other details that make a Victorian a Victorian.

But after downloading some architectural elements from the Sketch-up library, and learning how to do complicated roofs better, I thought I would tackle it and see how close I could get.

It’s a bit simpler in architectural detail than my real dream house which would look more like the Carson Mansion in Eureka, but it does have the tower and wrap-around porch that I’ve always wanted.

So let’s take a tour of this behemoth, starting with the first floor.

First Floor

Entry Hall

After entering through the front door, we come into the grand hallway, with a staircase up to the second floor. Under the stairs is a Turkish Corner, where the fireplace in the hallway can be enjoyed. Wallpaper is Bradbury & Bradbury.The artwork featured is some of my favorite black and white landscape photography.

Parlor

The first room on the left is the parlor, reached through a pocket door. There is a second pocket door that connects the room to the drawing room, and that room can be further connected to the dining room, so that all three rooms can be effectively opened into one for large gatherings. The parlor makes use of the tower, with a built in seating nook.Portraits of the original owners decorate the room.

Drawing Room

In Victorian times, the women would gather in the Drawing Room after dinner to play cards, or gossip away from the men. The theme in this room is pirates, with some of my pirate photography and our model pirate ship that was built by Andy Doehner.

Dining Room

Bradbury & Bradbury had just introduced this Gothic roomset when I was working on this project, so the dining room received a Gothic theme to make use of it. The big Gothic Revival period during the Victorian era was a couple of decades earlier than this home but it’s never really gone out of style and we really love it, so one room gets the Gothic treatment.

Conservatory

The conservatory provides a nice transition from the formal dining room to the casual BBQ deck outside. Plants can be started, and unusual plants, like a collection of carnivorous plants, are grown here.

Kitchen

When I opened my studio on Main St. in Ferndale, we remodeled the interior to make it more Victorian like. We installed a tin ceiling and picture rail, and it was painted in white and two shades of yellow. If we ever get around to the kitchen in our current Victorian, we plan to duplicate the scheme, so that’s also how our dream Victorian kitchen is decorated.

Breakfast Nook

The breakfast nook provides a less formal place to eat meals. The room and the hallway leading to it are decorated with Bradbury’s Redwood Forest frieze. The walls are decorated with photos of Lori’s vintage clothing collection.

Library

The library uses the color and wallpaper scheme we used in my real home office.

Billiards Room

While the women would retreat to the Drawing Room, the men would congregate in the Billiards Room to drink their cognac and smoke their cigars. Neither of which I would enjoy, but I do like playing pool, and it provides the perfect place to hang some of my photographs that are attempts to duplicate what might have hung in saloons back in the day.

Music Room

Back at the front of the house on the right side of the hallway is the Music Room, a place to sit and enjoy the sounds from the grand piano. This room is decorated with some of my favorite color landscape photography.

Second Floor

Like any proper Victorian mansion, there are two staircases to get upstairs. The grand staircase in the hallway, for the owners and guests, and the back stairway, used primarily by the servants. So we’ll take the main stairway up.

Upstairs Hallway & Porch

The main hallway upstairs features some of my favorite photos that used extensive digital manipulation to make the concept a reality. At the front of the house, the hallway provides access to a small covered porch, the perfect place to enjoy some lemonade while viewing the pretty rose garden below.

Master Suite

The master bedroom sits above the parlor and also makes use of the tower for a seating area. There is further seating by the fireplace. The bed is a model of our actual bed. From the bedroom you pass through a dressing room with built-in closets, and then into the white tiled bathroom with a clawfoot tub and cage shower.

Main Guest Bedroom

This would be the main guest bedroom as it has its own attached bathroom. It is decorated with Renaissance Revival furniture.

Egyptian Guest Bedroom

Many of the elements here were borrowed from previous Egyptian rooms we did. We don’t really need this room or the Asian room, other than to satisfy our desire to decorate in these two styles.

Asian Guest Bedroom

Primarily decorated in Japanese style, it features some of my Asian themed photographs. This bedroom also has access to the porch on the back of the house.

Sewing Room

Lori gets a nice corner room for her sewing room so there’s lots of light. This is decorated with the Bradbury room set that we are currently installing in her real sewing room. I am also currently building her a new sewing table that will look much like that one. The sewing room has access to the deck that is above the porte-cochère.

Maid’s Bedroom

I’ve never been a big fan of someone else cleaning my house, but with a house this size it’s probably a necessity.

Laundry Room

The maid’s room is reached through the laundry room in the back of the house.

Third Floor

Photography Studio

With the steeply pitched roof, there is plenty of space in the attic to have a good sized photography studio.

Office

Since my office work is connected to my photography, there’s an office up in the attic as well.

Basement

Three floors and we’re not done exploring the house yet. We need to go back down to the first floor, and then under the back staircase there’s a set of stairs that will take us down to the basement, the entertainment center for the house.

Slot Car Room

The main room in the basement is home to a 4 lane HO slot car racetrack. There are plenty of workstations along the wall for people to tune their slotcars. There’s also a ping-pong table and an air hockey table.

Recording Studio

In my dreams, I have enough time and dedication to become proficient at guitar, bass, keyboards, sax and drums. Yeah, ain’t going to happen, but one can dream. So this is my place to make a lot of noice and not disturb anyone too much. Full digital recording studio allows me to turn out one hit record after another.

Home Theater

I liked the concept of the home theater in the beach house I did earlier that much of it gets duplicated in my dream home. The concept originally goes back to something I wanted to do in our San Jose bungalow. The wallpaper here is the Bradbury Glasgow Rose roomset we used in the parlor of our San Jose home.

Gym

The gym area includes workout machines, a hot tub and lap pool, and a mirrored area with bar for Lori to practice ballet. There’s also a bathroom/locker area.

Carriage House

The carriage house sits behind the house, reached by a driveway that passes under the porte-cochère. The porte-cochère provides covered access to the house through the side hall that has a cloak room and bathroom for guests.

Garage

The garage provides plenty of parking space for motorcycles and a few of my favorite vehicles such as a Dodge Superbird and a Ford Cobra. The Ford pickup is practical, and the Model A is for fun.

Woodshop

A complete professional grade woodshop, complete with dust vacuum sits in a wind off the back of the garage. A room behind that stores the yard tractor, lawn mower and all the other tools you need for a yard this size.

Gardener’s Apartment

If I had to actually take care of the yard, I wouldn’t have time to play slot cars, ride motorcycles, and record hit records. So I have a full time gardener, and he lives upstairs above the garage.

Garden

Rose Garden

The rose garden sits in the middle of the circular driveway, with a wisteria arbor running down the middle of it. Lots of boxwood to keep the gardener busy.

Orchard & Vegetable Garden

Along the driveway is an orchard with various fruit trees. Behind that is a vegetable garden.

Croquet Lawn

In addition to playing croquet, you can also play bocci, horseshoes, and chess.

Sunken Garden

This garden was inspired by some of the gardens we saw in England and Wales. Flower borders on each side for perennials surround a reflecting pond with fountain.

Japanese Garden

By the time I got to detailing the Japanese Garden, the project file was reaching the limit of the program. But a Torii Gate leads into an area with a pavilion and a Japanese tea house.