When constructing your world, do you approach it from the bottom-up or from the top-down? In other words, do you start with an idea, and then follow that idea until you've created a world, or do you set down the major elements of your world first and try to figure out the substance behind those elements afterwards? What's the reasoning behind your approach?
Personally, I used to be a top-down worldbuilder, but have since moved to a bottom-up model. Because I have little concern for telling any single story with my worlds, but instead want to use them for telling a wide-array of sprawling stories, I prefer to make my world be as diverse and dynamic as they can be. The bottom-up approach works best in this regard as it allows me to explore the world as I build it, and gives me more opportunity to spread the world in directions I wouldn't have thought of had I started from the top-down. I also believe that a bottom-up approach leads to a more coherent and organic world, as every step on the way is built on previous steps. That being said, I oftentimes do get ahead of myself and decide a number of key points that I wish to reach along my bottom-up worlbuilding journey, so perhaps I qualify more as an intermediary worldbuilder. I also think it's important to note the major deficit of the bottom-up approach... It takes a lot of time.
Let me know your approach.
Note: This question is for my fellow worldbuilders who like me find half (or more) of the fun of writing fiction in creating the worlds behind the stories. I also know that plenty of folk view the world around their story as an extension of the story, and thus approach the matter of worldbuilding from a story-centric perspective. I think this has been discussed enough times on the forum and in order to keep the discussion on topic I believe this perspective (though completely valid) doesn't need to be repeated.
Personally, I used to be a top-down worldbuilder, but have since moved to a bottom-up model. Because I have little concern for telling any single story with my worlds, but instead want to use them for telling a wide-array of sprawling stories, I prefer to make my world be as diverse and dynamic as they can be. The bottom-up approach works best in this regard as it allows me to explore the world as I build it, and gives me more opportunity to spread the world in directions I wouldn't have thought of had I started from the top-down. I also believe that a bottom-up approach leads to a more coherent and organic world, as every step on the way is built on previous steps. That being said, I oftentimes do get ahead of myself and decide a number of key points that I wish to reach along my bottom-up worlbuilding journey, so perhaps I qualify more as an intermediary worldbuilder. I also think it's important to note the major deficit of the bottom-up approach... It takes a lot of time.
Let me know your approach.
Note: This question is for my fellow worldbuilders who like me find half (or more) of the fun of writing fiction in creating the worlds behind the stories. I also know that plenty of folk view the world around their story as an extension of the story, and thus approach the matter of worldbuilding from a story-centric perspective. I think this has been discussed enough times on the forum and in order to keep the discussion on topic I believe this perspective (though completely valid) doesn't need to be repeated.