Old house new home: Facilitating interior design with RedesignUS in virtual reality

Abstract

Customized interiors not only reflect personality and offer protection against aesthetic exhaustion, but they also foster a sense of home. Virtual reality (VR) systems have previously leveraged the benefits of immersion, interactivity, and entertainment to empower interior design. These systems, however, largely ignore the need to renovate houses in favor of a more immersive VR experience. To demonstrate the significance of scene reconstruction in redesign, we conducted experience prototyping with 8 professionals, outlining our design goals. Then, we propose RedesignUS, a VR system that enables users to rebuild and customize their own homes. By providing users with the flexibility to synthesize existing room layouts and fine-tune various levels of their homes leveraging inspiration from others’ combinations, RedesignUS offers an unparalleled degree of customization. A 24-user empirical study confirms that our system boosts editing efficiency and allows users to explore more options of home decoration, broadening their design horizons. Furthermore, scene restoration leads to enhanced realism and familiarity, thereby increasing their trust in our system. Overall, our research investigates novel interactive paradigms and insights for DIY home improvement.