The Envelope refers to the three-dimensional space within which a building can legally be constructed on a given piece of land

Generate your allowable envelope, or the extents of your buildable area, with this transform.

The envelope transform models a complex building form using offsets and angles.

How to:

Select a polygon to use as the envelope boundary.

Click “Open Flow Builder”

Select “Envelope”

Envelope Settings:

1. Front, side, and rear tabs
   1. the offsets and height restrictions may vary on different sides of your site
   2. You can define different values for front, side, and rear
2. Levels: Height
3. Levels: Setback
4. Delete a level
5. Add a new level
6. Assign a definition to the geometry
   1. select a tab (ie Front)
   2. then click “select” on the geometry edges that should have that definition
7. Usage fills toggle
8. Edit Mode toggle
9. Forward properties
10. Edit display name

Edit Heights and Setbacks

Many zoning codes have stepped setback requirements. The height and setback settings allow for any combination of stepped condition.

Max Height: Input the maximum height of the building allowable by code

Levels

Height: The height vertically.

• Set to 0 for no height.
• Combine with a setback value greater than 0 for a sloped condition

Setback: The distance horizontally.

• Set to 0 for no setback.
• Combine with a height greater than 0 for a sloped condition

Add level: Add another height/setback requirement

The combination of heights and setbacks results in an envelope shape:

Sample of how height and setback affects the resulting shape

Edit sides

Many zoning codes have different setbacks for different street frontages. Control up to 3 different conditions and apply them to sides of your model.

Select the Front, Rear, or Side tab to change the settings. Adjust height and setbacks for each tab as desired.

There are 2 ways to apply a condition to the envelope geometry:

In the app UI:

Click “select” on the applicable edges.

Click unselect to un-apply the condition.

On the Model:

Toggle “edit mode”

Click the dot at the center of an edge.

Select the condition to apply.

Envelope Output:

The default output of the envelope is a generic mass with no usage applied. The shape will reflect the setbacks, heights, and slopes applied.

You can choose to apply a usage to the output, or you can use Usage Fills to create a generative output:

Usage Fills

With Usage fills toggled on, the envelope will generatively fill with Usages.

1. toggle on/off
2. Select another usage to add to the mix
3. Click add to add the selected Usage
4. Delete usage from the mix
5. Swap to another usage
6. Set the desired mix %
7. Set floor to floor height of usage
8. Set minimum sqft to add (override %)
9. Set maximum sqft to add (override %)

The Usages will render within the envelope.

The floors will honor setbacks and slopes.

Usage Mix toggled on