Most people fail before they even touch paper. They think about "the room" as a box they’re standing outside of, looking in. But that’s not how eyes work. If you want to learn how to draw the inside of a house, you have to stop drawing objects and start drawing the space between them.
Perspective is the monster under the bed for most art students. It’s scary because it feels like math. Honestly? It kind of is. But it’s the good kind of math—the kind that makes a flat piece of paper look like a place you could actually walk into and take a nap. If you ignore the horizon line, your couch will look like it’s sliding off the floor. Your windows will look like they’re melting.
I’ve seen beginners spend hours detailing a rug only to realize the walls don't actually meet at the corner. Don't be that person.
The Linear Perspective Trap
Linear perspective is basically just a trick our brains play on us. Back in the Renaissance, guys like Filippo Brunelleschi figured out that if you draw lines back to a single "vanishing point," you can simulate 3D depth perfectly. It changed everything. For an interior, you’re usually looking at One-Point Perspective.
Imagine standing in the middle of a long hallway. All the lines—the top of the doorframes, the baseboards, the ceiling tiles—all seem to point toward one tiny dot at the very end of the hall. That’s your vanishing point.
If you’re drawing a bedroom or a living room, you usually start with a "back wall" (a simple rectangle). Then, you pick a point on your horizon line. Every other line that is moving away from you must connect to that point. If it doesn't, the room will feel broken. It’s a rigid rule, but once you get it, you’re free.
💡 You might also like: Why Words I Wish I Said by Caitlin Kelly Became a Gen Z Cultural Phenomenon
Finding the Horizon Line in Your Own Living Room
Here is the secret: the horizon line is always at your eye level. Always.
If you sit on the floor, the horizon line drops. Now you’re looking up at the underside of the coffee table. If you stand on a ladder, the horizon line is way up high. You’ll see the tops of the bookshelves and the dust on the ceiling fan.
Why scale ruins everything
Most people draw chairs too small. They really do. They draw a massive window and then a tiny little chair underneath it. In reality, a standard chair seat is about 18 inches off the ground. A doorknob is usually 36 inches high. These are the "anchors" of a room. If you get the door height wrong, the whole room feels like a dollhouse or a giant’s lair.
How to Draw the Inside of a House One Step at a Time
Start with the "Big Box." Don't draw the TV. Don't draw the cat. Just draw the room as if it were empty and made of glass.
- The Back Wall: Draw a rectangle in the center of your page. This is the wall furthest from you.
- The Vanishing Point: Put a dot somewhere inside that rectangle. This is where your eyes are looking.
- The Orthogonals: Draw lines from the corners of your paper through the corners of that rectangle, all meeting at the dot. Suddenly, you have a floor, a ceiling, and two side walls.
- The Floor Grid: This is the pro move. If you draw a grid on the floor using that vanishing point, you can place furniture accurately. You’ll know exactly how much space that rug takes up.
Dealing with the "Stuff"
Furniture is just smaller boxes inside the big box. That’s it. If you want to draw a sofa, start by drawing a rectangular block in the correct perspective. Then, round off the edges. Add cushions. Throw a blanket over it.
The mistake is trying to draw "a sofa" from the start. Sofas are complicated. Cubes are easy.
Lighting and the "Vibe"
A room without shadows isn't a room; it's a technical drawing. To make it feel like a home, you need a light source. Is it the lamp in the corner? The sunlight hitting the floor from the window?
Shadows follow the same perspective rules as the walls. If the light is coming from the left, the shadows of the chair legs will stretch out to the right. Use a soft 2B or 4B pencil for this. Hard lines are for architecture; soft edges are for life.
✨ Don't miss: Tamales de Elote Salvadoreños: Why the Real Thing Never Uses Cornmeal
Common Mistakes That Kill Realism
- Parallel Lines that Aren't: In one-point perspective, vertical lines (like the corners of walls) must stay perfectly vertical. Horizontal lines (like the back of the bed) stay perfectly horizontal. If they tilt even a little bit, the house looks like it's leaning.
- Too Much Detail Too Fast: I’ve seen artists spend forty minutes drawing the wood grain on a floor before they’ve even decided where the door goes. Stop. Get the skeleton right first. The skin comes later.
- Ignoring Overlap: In a real house, things hide other things. The plant sits in front of the window. The coffee table hides part of the sofa. Overlap creates "depth" faster than perspective ever will. It tells the viewer's brain, "This object is closer than that one."
Advanced Interior Drawing: Two-Point Perspective
Sometimes, you aren't looking straight at a wall. You're looking at a corner. This is when you use Two-Point Perspective.
Instead of one vanishing point, you have two—one on the far left and one on the far right of your paper (often they are actually off the paper). Every line goes to one of those two points. It’s more complex, but it looks much more natural and dynamic. It’s how architectural photographers usually frame a room to make it look expensive.
Actionable Next Steps for Your Sketchbook
To actually get good at this, you can't just read about it. You have to mess up a few drawings first.
- The Viewfinder Trick: Take a piece of cardboard and cut a small rectangular hole in it. Hold it up and look through it. It "flattens" the room into a 2D image, making it way easier to see where the lines actually go.
- The Tape Method: Use low-tack painter's tape on your floor to create a grid. When you try to draw that grid, you’ll suddenly see how the squares "compress" as they get further away.
- Trace a Photo: Seriously. Take a photo of your bedroom, print it out in black and white (low opacity), and use a ruler to find the vanishing point. Trace the main lines. It trains your hand and eye to recognize the angles you usually ignore.
Interior drawing is about logic. Once you set the "rules" of your room with your vanishing point and horizon line, the drawing basically finishes itself. You just have to follow the lines you already laid down. Keep your pencil light, keep your eraser handy, and remember that even professional architects use rulers.