Square foot or foot square?

[Mazzini]

This sounds really silly but I am having a complete mental blank here and the more I think, the more undecided I become...

If a storage unit size is said to be, say, 10sq.ft. that does mean a floor area total with dimensions of maybe 10ft x 1ft or 5ft x 2ft doesn't it?

I keep wondering if it means 10ft x 10ft but isn't that ft.sq rather than sq.ft?

Could make a lot of difference if one were to choose the wrong one!

[jno]

you're right. 10x1, 5x2 etc. 10x10 is 10 foot square or 100 square feet.

[Mazzini]

Thank you for confirming that jno, I don't want to rent a cupboard!

[SeaJayPea]

To be 100% accurate, there are two separate things here.

10 x 1, or 5 x 2 or even 2.5 x 4 all equal 10 square feet, which isn't very much.

A square room which had walls 10 ft x 10ft would have an area of 100 square feet. (It could be called a 10 foot square, but that would confuse things, wouldn't it?)

Sorry, can't resist a bit of arithmetical pedantry