A question perhaps primarily aimed at, if not Inkscape users specifically, those using vector drawing tools for their maps ....

I've been messing around (very slowly! ) in the last few months making various efforts to start redrafting some of my world maps. I'm using Inkscape, and trying to figure out the most efficient way to prepare some basic maps of continent-sized regions or large chunks thereof. I've been wrestling with the best way to delimit the area on which I'm working. How do others start out?

For example, do folks start by drawing a big rectangle as a map edge or border and then attach, say, coastlines directly to that frame (so that one could, perhaps apply fills of colours, etc. to the area delimited by the combination of coastlines and map edge/border)? Or, though this seems a sensible way to set out to me, will it cause unforseen problems for me at a later more detail-oriented stage?

How do people actually begin from scratch? I guess that's kind of what I'm asking .... I suppose that seems like a very dumb, basic question that perhaps has obvious answers, but being totally new to digital mapmaking there might be strategies that should be staring me in the face, but aren't!