This is a tutorial on building a memory palace using the method of loci to learn sequences of items by anchoring them along a mental journey within a familiar setting. This technique, also known in various forms as the journey method or the Roman Room technique, has been used for memorization since ancient Greece and was utilized by Roman orators such as Cicero, who saw memory training as part of the study of rhetoric.

1. Memory Palace / The Method of Loci
The method of Loci is simple to explain but takes some practice to become more proficient. However,
you can realize immediate effects.
1. Begin by choosing a place you are very familiar with, such as somewhere you have lived,
worked, or studied.
2. Plan out a path through the rooms and other landmarks of the area. You can have multiple stops
per room, and use the outside if it helps. Focus on specific locations you can link together on
the path and visualize. Try to get at least twenty specific positions on your path.
3. Take a list you want to memorize. You can start with a list of countries in a specific continent,
counties in a state, English kings, American presidents, or your shopping list.
4. For each item, in order, create a mental image at the next available position on the path.
Visualize something memorable, and if possible link it to the prior place.
5. Make the image for each location interact with the location if possible as well. Make them stand
out, come alive, and interact with the surroundings.
6. Practice remembering the items in their places as you mentally travel through your memory
palace. You can do this while building up the list if it is longer so you keep your progress.
7. You should combine this with spaced repetition to maintain the list for a longer time by practicing
it at increasing intervals.
Memory Palace Example
We will use the thirteen original colonies that became the United States of America.
From Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirteen_Colonies
The Thirteen Colonies in their traditional groupings were: the New England Colonies (New
Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut); the Middle Colonies (New
York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware); and the Southern Colonies (Maryland,
Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia).
Now imagine these items in order while walking slowly through your memory palace with each in its
ordered place.

2. 1. Connecticut - "Can I cut?" cutting some cake with a soup can
2. Delaware - DEL-aware, a keyboard with a glowing, pulsating red DEL key
3. Georgia- a Georgia peach (a woman from Georgia, holding a peach)
4. Maryland- a small plane crowded with brides, landing at the other end of the room.
5. Massachusetts - a massive pile of chewing gum stuck to Lego sets
6. New Hampshire - a hobbit from the shire walking in with a new ham
7. New Jersey - someone wearing a new sports jersey with the tags still on
8. New York - a tiny Yorkshire terrier puppy wearing a bow, coming out of a gift box.
9. North Carolina - a woman wearing a T-shirt that says Carol with a wicked Yankee accent
10. Pennsylvania - a humanoid pencil who is looking veiny preening in a vanity mirror
11. Rhode Island- a roadie for a band wearing island-style clothes
12. Virginia - a virgin doing whatever you prefer, maybe waiting for some ritual sacrifice
13. South Carolina - a Southern Belle dressed for a ball wearing a sash that says Carol
Putting the Items in Place
Here is a sketch of the floor plan of a former home of mine. It is better to imagine a place you are
familiar with instead of this one, but it is easier to demonstrate the concept with a concrete example.
There are thirteen labeled locations which we will use to illustrate the method. We have not used as
many locations as we normally would (around 20), because we only need thirteen, and it's beneficial to
keep things simple when just starting. out.

3. The locations are:
1. Home Office
2. Office/shop Hallway
3. Entryway
4. Kitchen
5. Main bathroom, with laundry area
6. Front Bedroom
7. Living room, picture window
8. Porch
9. Dining table
10. Den, fireplace area
11. Deck
12. Master Bedroom
13. Master bathroom
First practice walking through your memory palace in your mind visualizing it in as much detail as
possible.
Make sure you have the order of the locations clear so that you can remember them in order, easily
before moving on to the next part.

4. Next, we walk through our imagery and imagine it in each of the locations in order.
For the room labeled 1, a home office, I imagine cutting a wedding cake with a can while saying "Can I
cut?" to remind myself of Connecticut. Similarly, for 2 the office/shop hallway, imagine a giant keyboard
with a delete key labeled "DEL" pulsing with a red light and continue in the same way for each image in
each location in order.
Spaced Retrieval Intervals
There are various ways to structure the intervals, but the simplest to remember is a version of the rule
of five: 5x a day for 1 day, once a day for five days, once a week for five weeks, once a month for five
months. The original "Rule of Five" originated with memory champion Dominic O'Brien.
Visualizations
Here are some AI-generated images to help with visualizing things on your first go, but your imagination
is the best way because it will always be available for use.

5. I hope you have enjoyed this post, and that the memory palace technique helps you with your studies
and other memorization needs. If you liked this article you can Subscribe to LearnedMemory.com.