STUDY GUIDE · GKU 1
Architectural design study guide (Architecture)
This unit is half of the Architecture exam. It covers how a design is built up from first principles: the elements and ordering principles of form and space, circulation and the geometry of stairs and ramps, reading a site and its climate, placing a building against the sun, turning a client's needs into a programme of areas and adjacencies, working within the planning envelope of floor area ratio, coverage and setbacks, the stages of the design process, and landscape. The second part covers how a design is communicated and tested: freehand drawing and projections, scaled models, digital media and BIM, and design computation and simulation. Where a question is computational the guide teaches the calculation; numeric code limits differ between jurisdictions, so the exam gives them and so do the examples here.
Structured by the official ETEC subject standard for this topic: every listed topic and learning outcome, with formulas, figures and worked examples. The full sections are available to members in the app.
SKU 1.1 · The design process
Fundamentals of design: form, space and order
The vocabulary every design question assumes: the primary elements of form, how planes define space, the ordering principles, proportion and scale, and how a grid coordinates structure and use.
Circulation, stairs, ramps and egress
How movement organises a building, and the geometry that makes it safe: circulation configurations, stair risers and treads, ramp lengths, occupant loads and exit widths.
Environmental conditions, context and site analysis
What to record about a site and its climate, how each observation becomes a design decision, the passive strategies for the Saudi climates, and what local and heritage architecture teaches about building for them.
Sun angles and shading design
The solar geometry behind orientation: declination, hour angle, altitude and azimuth, the profile angle on a facade, and the overhang depth that shades a window, with the reason west windows need vertical screens.
Planning and programming: spaces, areas and adjacencies
How a client's needs become an architectural programme: the space list, net and gross areas and the efficiency that links them, the adjacency matrix and bubble diagram, and how an existing building is tested against a programme.
Site planning controls: FAR, coverage, setbacks and parking
How planning regulations shape the building envelope on a plot: floor area ratio, site coverage, setbacks and height together, the one that governs, and the parking a programme generates.
The design process: stages, alternatives and evaluation
The stages a project moves through from brief to use, why design loops rather than runs in a line, how alternatives are generated and judged, and the duty to protect health, safety and welfare.
Landscape design
The principles and elements of landscape design, how planting, water and paving shape a microclimate, and how to design outdoor space for a hot dry climate with little water.
SKU 1.2 · Architectural representation and visualisation
Sketching and freehand architectural drawing
The drawing types architects use and what each one shows, scale and line weight, how a perspective is set up, and the freehand sketch as a tool for thinking and for talking to clients.
Scaled architectural models
The kinds of physical model, which scale and material suit which question, how lengths, areas and volumes scale, and models used as test instruments for sun and daylight.
Digital and visual communication
Drafting software against building information modelling, levels of development, rendering and immersive media, presentation boards, and matching the medium to the stakeholder.
Design computation and performance simulation
Parametric and generative design, the simulations that test a design (daylight, energy, sun, airflow), the daylight factor and window-to-wall ratio as hand checks, and choosing among options with a Pareto front.