Buildings & Levels

Buildings & Levels Overview

Buildings & Levels are powerful tools for managing layouts and designs. While using Buildings & Levels is completely optional, the tools help organize layout and design information which is especially helpful on larger, more complex projects consisting of multiple buildings (ex. multi-family) or projects with multiple levels (ex. floor and roof systems).

Even for single building and single level projects, you may find the tools useful for defining some basic level defaults. Understanding the available tools empowers you to decide on what is most effective for your design process.

A project Layout can have one or more Buildings.
Each Building can have one or more Levels.
Each Level can have layout objects.

Video Transcript:

Welcome, in this video we are going to provide a quick overview of the new buildings and levels features in Paragon.

After we have launched a new project we can add a building and then levels for each.

To do so, I’ll click on the Buildings & Levels menu under the Project name at the top and add a Building. I’ll go over to the properties and change the name to BUILDING 1.

Now that we have a Building, we can see we have a couple of options.

We can Edit Properties, adjust our settings for the Building and Delete the Building. As you see we also have options to add an additional building, add more Levels or to show entire building.

Let’s add one additional level here as well. We will name this Level ROOF, and I’ll set the plate elevation to 9 foot 4 inches, and set the wall height to 8 feet. If you would like additional information you can hover over the tool tips on the right, which will provide you with the definitions for these properties.

Now that we have multiple levels we have view options. Clicking on the eye icon turns the view of the level on or off. And clicking on the name of the Level makes the level active and is indicated with a yellow star.

Clicking on the 3 dots we can see similar options for properties, viewing options, settings and deleting the level. And lastly, you can rearrange your levels by simply clicking and dragging the levels up or down in the order you prefer..

Let’s go back and rename the level that was automatically created when we clicked to add a Building. Clicking on the layer makes it active, and allows us to edit the name, as well as other properties. I’ll change the name to FLOOR. I’ll set the wall height to an inch and a half, and set the floor height to 16 inches.

Let’s see how these levels allow us to organize and make better use of our time.

Since we are on our FLOOR level I’ll start adding our structure by adding bearing envelopes.

We will set these properties to have the Elevations Match Level Settings. You can set the settings as you need, but for this purpose we want the settings to match the level settings

You may see this box highlighted in yellow. If that is the case the properties are not set the same as the level. Clicking the box will change the settings to match the Level.

Next I’ll add in a feature pattern container for our floor trusses. I’ll use the edges of our bearing envelopes to create the container. Notice that the container has a top elevation of 1 foot 4 inches, just like the properties we set for this level.

Next I'll add some Truss envelopes. I’ll want to change the component type to be Floor Trusses.

We will use our tools and features and take the walls we just added, and we are going to copy them up to the roof level.

So, I’ll select all of the walls, and we can see over in the properties it currently shows the walls on the FLOOR level.

I’ll click the move option to change the levels. To copy the walls, I’ll select the option to duplicate before moving, and select the option here to change the level/building. Under the Change Level/Building I’ll change the Level to ROOF. I need to click APPLY to make the change take place.

Let's take a quick look at this in our 3D view.

Looking at the properties of the ROOF level let’s make sure the elevations match level settings, so they absorb what the level is set to.

I'm going to select the option here to view the entire building, so we can see the roof level and the floor level at the same time.

We need to add our roof planes, so I'm going to make the ROOF level as the current level and this will turn off my FLOOR level, so that it's out of my way.

I’ll add the roof planes, to the newly copied walls, to show that copying the walls works as normal.

Now that we have the roof planes I’ll select them all and quickly cut them.

Let's add a few truss envelopes. Once we have our trusses placed and designed we can view these in 3D.

We can turn on and off certain levels to get a better view of what we have on each level.

Here you can see our levels: there's a count of truss envelopes. I have 21 on the Floor Level and 17 in the roof level.

We hope this video has shown you the process and steps of working with buildings and levels, along with the tools and features that you can implement into your daily workflow.

Thanks for watching!

Add and Edit Buildings & Levels

When starting a new project, there are no Buildings or Levels. It is possible to create Buildings & Levels at the onset of a project or you can define them at any time after inserting them into your layout.

Add Building

Add Building allows you to create one or more Buildings in a Layout. By default, new levels are automatically named with a numeral.

Edit Building Properties

Click the 3-dot menu to access Edit Properties which allows you to rename the Building in the right sidebar.

Add Levels

When adding a Building, Level 1 is automatically created. Use Add Levels to create additional levels for your project.

Easily reorder your levels via drag-and-drop. Simply left click and drag the level to the desired sequence in the list.

Levels that include Truss Envelopes/Components must also include the supporting Bearing Envelopes.

Edit Level Properties

Click the 3-dot menu to access Edit Level Properties which allows you to rename the Level and adjust elevation and height settings in the right sidebar.

Plate Elevation: The elevation of this level's top plate.
Wall Height: By default, walls will start at the Plate elevation and extend down this distance.
Floor Depth (Height): By default, floors will start at the Plate elevation and extend up this distance.