FORMGIVINGBACK TO THE APP ↗

ABOUT / THE WORKSPACE

A MASSING STUDY ON YOUR REAL SITE, IN THE BROWSER.

FORMGIVING turns a site boundary into a first three-dimensional massing. Search for a place, click the corners of the site on satellite imagery, and see building volumes rise in place, next to the buildings that are already there. It is free, runs in the browser, and needs no account.

START A STUDY ↗

01 / WHAT IT IS FOR

BEFORE THE
SCHEME.

It is made for the questions that come before a scheme: how much building fits, how tall it wants to be, where it throws shadow, and which of several forms reads best on this particular lot.

01

FIND THE SITE.

Search an address, city or place. The map or the satellite image stays underneath while you work.

02

DRAW THE BOUNDARY.

Click the corners of the lot. The app measures the site area, the longest edge and its bearing from true north.

03

SET THE BRIEF.

Choose the number of floors and the program mix. If you know the floor area ratio or lot coverage limit, enter it as a percentage of site area: the readout then says how many square metres the massing on screen is under or over the number you entered.

04

GENERATE FORMS.

The default, Generate, reads the shape of the parcel and draws a figure from a seed. The seed board shows six seeds side by side, and a massing that breaks a basic building rule (overlapping volumes, a box floating in the air, an unreasonable cantilever, a footprint outside the parcel) is held back while better options exist. Six fixed types are there too: Podium, Vertical, Cascading, Helix, Courtyard and Signature.

05

COMPARE AND KEEP ONE.

Pin the seeds you like and compare them. Read the measured floor area, FAR and site coverage of the form on screen, and its height against the nearby buildings. Turn on sun and shadow to see the ground shadow the proposal casts at a time of day, or sun hours across the whole day.

02 / WHAT YOU TAKE AWAY

A MODEL,
THE DATA,
A LINK.

03 / WHAT IT IS NOT

A STARTING POINT.
NOT AN APPROVAL.

Generated massing is conceptual. A boundary you draw is not a surveyed or legal parcel. The FAR and coverage limits are numbers you enter, not a zoning lookup, and the app compares the form against them rather than fitting it to them. The result is not a zoning approval, a code review or construction documentation. Shadows show the proposal only; neighbouring buildings are drawn from map data and do not cast shadows in the study. Check the applicable rules and a survey before using a study on a real project.

04 / QUESTIONS

ASKED
OFTEN.

Is it free?
Yes. There is no account and no sign-up; the study runs in your browser.
Which file formats can I export?
OBJ and GLB for the 3D massing, GeoJSON for the study, and an image of the view. Area figures are in square metres.
Will I get the same result twice?
Yes. Each generated form comes from a seed, and the same seed on the same site and inputs draws the same massing. The seed travels in the share link.
Can it tell me what my zoning allows?
No. It does not look up zoning. You enter the floor area ratio and coverage limits yourself, and the readout shows how far the massing on screen is under or over them.
Where does the map come from?
Satellite imagery from Esri World Imagery, building outlines from OpenFreeMap, and address search from Nominatim (OpenStreetMap). Those requests go from your browser to those services.
Which languages does it speak?
English, Korean, Spanish, Japanese, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese and Arabic. Spanish is in beta; some technical text is still in English.

05 / THE NUMBERS FIRST?

WORKING OUT
THE NUMBERS?

The same studio publishes construction and area calculators that show their work: lot size, square footage, area unit conversion and drawing scale. Open the calculators ↗

06 / HELP SHAPE THE TOOL

WHAT SHOULD
WORK BETTER?

An idea, a confusing step, or something broken—tell us.

GIVE FEEDBACK ↗REPORT A BUG ↗

Opens your email app. For a bug, include the steps and your browser. Share only information you are comfortable sending.