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There's actually a checkbox option for this called "Show Living Area Label" under: Edit / Default Settings / Plan /. It's at the bottom in the Living Area section.

Thanks Eric! I guess I wasn't missing something then, and was on the right track then with my remark about dropping it in as a freestanding object first. This seems like a non-intuitive brute force way to get the job done though. Consider the user experience -- all I did was change my countertop thickness and suddenly there's a huge air gap, and the only way to fix it is to delete the sink that I carefully did size, placement and materials for, and drop in a new one and redo. Like I say, not so elegant and they should fix it. Now onto my next challenge -- how to make a cabinet tube light *NOT* follow the cathedral vault slope when placed under a wall cabinet... Chuck

I didn't change the height of the countertop - I changed its thickness. Regardless, I'd like to try changing sink height, but am not able to find where that parameter gets entered. There does not seem to be a control for sink height when I open the base cabinet, and the sink does not seem to have any controls of its own when dropped into a cabinet. I suppose I could drop it into the plan as a freestanding object, and then copy it over the existing sink opening above the sink that's too low, but that's not so elegant ;-) What am I missing?

I changed thickness of a countertop from 1-1/2" (default) down to 3/4", and now undermount sinks appear to be floating 3/4" below the bottom of the countertop. Thinking this was just a regen bug, I tried building a new cabinet and changing countertop thickness to 3/4" BEFORE placing an undermount sink, but alas I get the same result. Are all undermount sinks placed 1-1/2" below countertop surface, regardless of the countertop thickness? The air-gap in 3D views is unsightly, and I'm wondering if there's a way to fix this... Thanks!!

Let's say that I want to do a minor edit of an existing HD Core Catalog model. For example, I'd like to make a copy of the "Single Basin Undermount Sink", delete the soap dispenser, and save it as a new model to my User Catalog. As an HD Pro 2020 user, is there a way to do this without having to suffer too much expense or learning ramp on a tool that will get this done? After 20 minutes of exploring ref manual and HomeTalk, I'm not seeing it. Can anybody provide a link or list a few steps they'd use for this? Thanks much...

For our remodel project we want to vault a room that's currently got a hip roof, converting MOST of the roof into a full width gable. We'd like to leave the existing wall with a bay window intact along with its short hip roof "skirt", making the rest of it a gable (see attached hand drawing). Can anyone give me some hints on the best approach for entering this with Home Designer Pro 2019? After having watched the online videos, I've been experimenting by drawing little test houses with Gable/Roof Lines, overgrown dormers, and have not yet figured out how to construct this. Am I missing an obvious way to do it, or is this a complex thing that I need to get some expert help with? Thanks!

Keith, You were right, and that makes sense with 1.5" sill being standard. The only way I could see and confirm this was by looking at it using Framing Overview and drawing more colored cylinder shapes. See the attached - the white cylinder is 6" from Terrain to SWT, Red is your 1.5" tall sill plate, and blue is the 12-5/8" tall floor structure on top of the sill plate that gets us up to the top of the subfloor. Thanks much!!!

I'm at that point in my HD education where I'm trying to make sense of the relationships between Terrain Subfloor Height, Room Structure elevations and relative heights. The default 20-1/8" above Terrain for (top of) subfloor is supposed to be the sum of: - 6" from terrain surface to SWT, or the white object in my attached cut-section view. - Floor structure (dimension "L" in diagram), or the 12-5/8" tall blue object in my cut-section view. These two things add up to 18-5/8". In my cut-section view, what happened to the missing 1-1/2" from the top of my blue object (12-5/8"), to the 20/18" from terrain to subfloor (red object)? Hopefully I won't feel too dumb when somebody explains this to me ;-) Thanks!

Sorry, I wasn't trying to suggest that a compass bearing would be entered into the existing Wall Specification dialog / Wall Angle. Instead, I was thinking that clicking on any house wall (or other line) would be done similarly as part of the North Pointer dialog, as a way to tell it what North is relative to the house. You mentioned "magnetic North" twice again. So Pro can indeed work in terms of magnetic North in addition to True (Geographic) North? So no rotation of terrain is needed in Pro either, just re-positioning? Glad to know that HD Pro makes this process easier/better.

Thanks much DJP! You mentioned magnetic North twice, but I can't find Pro reference manual mention of magnetic North (or magnetic declination/variation, etc.). It's all written as True North (i.e., geographic) North. Is handling of magnetic North instead a Premiere or Interiors capability? Yeah, house rotation seemed like a REALLY bad idea to me. Once that's painstakingly done, any house edits would then be painful. With Pro, what happens if you FIRST set up the North Pointer, and THEN you enter terrain using the length and compass bearing specs as described in the KB article https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00850/drawing-a-plot-plan.html ? Is terrain rotation still required, or does Pro obey the North Pointer, and draw property lines with the correct rotation angle? The nirvana application process/behavior for me would be something like: 1) Draw house with (most) walls square to the screen, never to be rotated. 2) Tell the app which screen direction is True North (e.g., North Pointer), by clicking on any house wall (or any other line) and then entering its compass bearing with respect to True North. 3) Draw terrain property lines by entering plat data as per the KB article, with no terrain rotation necessary. 4) XY re-position the terrain property lines simply by clicking on a house corner then property line, and then specifying setback distance. Eric's suggestions for HD Architecture of creating a separate plan file for terrain that includes house alignment marks seem like a great approach. Do you have any other tricks that would be helpful for us Architecture users? Thanks again!

Creating a separate plan file with lot terrain and house wall alignment marks is a novel approach! Regarding Pro, I didn't get that notion from the KB article. I searched around and discovered reference to the "North Pointer" in the product comparison matrix, and then found things like this in the Pro reference manual" "The North Pointer tool is used to define the direction of true north in a plan. The direction of north does not affect the orientation of the Snap and Reference grids, but it does affect the direction of sunlight and sun shadows, how conditioned area totals are calculated, and how bearing information is interpreted by the program." Because getting plat lot bearings accurately placed onto a plan that's screen-aligned to house walls appears to be a painful / non-obvious process, I was thinking this "North Pointer" feature is a deliberate up-sell tool. I haven't installed Pro to experiment with the limits/scope of this "North Pointer" tool yet. I was hoping one of you experts has been down this road before and could shed light on things :-). Does this "North Pointer" tool do anything to make this plat entry and house orientation process less painful? Thanks again!

Thanks Eric, Attached is a screen shot. As I mentioned in my original post, I've already entered the house plan such that vertically "up screen" is from front to back of the house. By that I meant that the screen is square with the house. Vertically up on the screen is approximately Northwest direction in the real world (not implicitly North, or +90deg ala Home Designer Architecture). As mentioned, the terrain is entered quickly/roughly using methods that are relative to the house. If I were to enter the terrain using compass bearing info relative to True North from the plat according to KB article https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00850/drawing-a-plot-plan.html, I'd have a terrain that is NOT oriented correctly vs. house. So I'm trying to figure out what's the best way forward here for HD Architecture. Let's say that I leave the house square with the screen, which I think is the right way. I think house rotation would be a pain for future plan edits. Would you recommend re-entering the terrain lot boundary precisely from plat bearings, and then do a lot of fiddling around with rotation and placement shifts of the terrain until things line up right? I'd much rather be able to tell Home Designer that vertically up the screen (parallel to a house wall) is actually bearing N70deg12'45"W, and then just enter my terrain property lines using plat bearings as per the KB article. Is that a convenience only HD Pro users enjoy, or is there an easy way using HD Architecture too? I hope I've explained things better this time...

Hi Eric, Although the house is not drawn on the paper plat, I found the surveyor pins at our property corners. I then used a long tape measure to get distances from pins to the house front corners, so I've got very precise azimuth/distances hence setbacks, etc. Yes, I quickly drew a terrain on the HDA plan with respect to the house walls, but have not cross-checked it thoroughly yet. So both the property lines and the house will need to be rotated or otherwise referenced properly with respect to True North. I could easily re-draw terrain with respect to True North (instead of the house) if that's the better way to go about it. Thanks!

I've been trying to understand the intended process for creating an accurately oriented finished plan where: 1) Terrain is entered according to my plat map data for our lot (compass quadrant bearings, lengths, curve data) 2) House walls are not perpendicular nor parallel to our lot property lines 3) House walls and other features are *easily* entered, without having to manually calculate and adjust angles with respect to True North (i.e., vertically "up-screen" is parallel to a primary house wall while entering data). Given that I'm using HD Architecture (not Pro), I'm scratching my head as to what process the folks at Chief Architect think I SHOULD be following to do this. I'm also wondering what I should do NOW, since I'm basically done entering the (pre-remodel) plan for our house where "vertically "up-screen" is from front to back (and heading roughly Northwest). I've found the article on how to draw a plot plan: https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00850/drawing-a-plot-plan.html, that shows applicability to HD Architecture. I've also found various forum postings by DJP and others like https://hometalk.chiefarchitect.com/topic/1666-plat-map-help/#comment-9629. Can anybody help explain the least painful plat/plan orientation process for HD Architecture? Is this just an intended limitation and frustration for getting folks to upgrade to HD Pro (i.e., the addition of the "North Pointer" tool)? Thanks! PS: I'm still a relatively new user -- please forgive me if I've missed something obvious. It takes quite a while to watch all those videos and read postings ;-)

Thanks AppleWalker! I probably should have built my Bay Window using the Build/Window/Bay Window/ tool such that this easier method would be available. Unfortunately I constructed and tweaked the 3 surfaces and windows manually, so the custom slab method was my only choice. I did this during my first couple days using Home Designer Architect - didn't know any better ;-).

Aha -- that's clever! Thanks Jo_Ann! By the way, I'm thinking that this program ought to be clever enough on its own to figure out that soffits generated in the ordinary way shouldn't be poking outside of exterior walls. We shouldn't have to resort to such "hacking" to get the job done... Thanks again.

I'm stumped again on generating soffit objects that can be inserted into odd places. This time, I'd like to put a soffit above a bay window that is flush with the wall on either side of the bay window. Please see attached screen grab. Inserting a longer "regular" soffit would poke outside the building. What I'd like to do is insert a wedge shape, but there does not appear to be a way to rotate a wedge 90deg onto its side as shown in the wireframe lines that I show in red. What am I missing? Thanks!

Thanks Jo_Ann. Does usage of a wedge shape imply having to tweak it any time surrounding walls, roof, soffit position/height, etc. change? Or will the wedge shape automatically align and adjust itself? I'd like to find a "low maintenance" solution if possible ;-)

Thanks Solver - I've added Home Designer Architectural 2018 (64 bit) to my Signature. Hopefully I won't be needing an upgrade to Pro!

I'm trying to figure out how to create soffits above kitchen cabinets, where the soffit top goes all the way up to the 12:6 vaulted ceiling top (i.e., soffit walls in "attic" layer). Please see my red markup lines in the attached .PNG file. I've tried resizing the soffit upward, but that just results in a top corner of the soffit sticking out of the roof :-). Is there a better/clean way to do this? Perhaps it's technically not a soffit any more with this type of construct, but is called and built as something else? I've watched some videos and looked through the reference manual but can't figure it out. Thanks!