What is your design experience? (granite, drapes, ceiling, tile)
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So in reading some of the threads, I was curious to know who everyone is here. What brought you to this forum? What excites you about design? Do you work in a design field? Are you a student? Do you have a passion for design but make your living in another arena?
Me? I'm in my 40's and I live outside of Chicago. I should have studied design to begin with, but I was shuffled off into bible college--which I loved--but didn't have a design program. I studied psychology and then ended up working as a networking administrator. I earn a good living, and I enjoy my work, but it lacks a creative component which I crave. I've always looked at home dec and design magazines and love thinking about interiors. I often start redecorating a room in my mind as soon as I am through the door.
Over the past 3 years I've been taking design classes to see if it would be a good fit and it seems that it is. I'm finding that interior design is multi-facited and requires a lot more than just a good design sense. You have to be able to plan projects, organize, manage people, communicate well, manage high stress situations, time management, work under deadlines, etc...
I'm still a bit nervous about making the switch, as it will be like starting over salary wise. But I think it can be worth it to do something you love.
Oh so ya want our resumes huh? My friends, I can assure you my resume reads like a who's who in America but during these depression times, it doesn't matter. I have a wall full of awards, certificates of achievements, pictures of me doing kitchens for the most famous people in the world, and I brag that I have designed more then 6000 kitchens over 30+ years. But it don't mean a hill of beans if no one is buying what your selling anymore. Selling kitchens today is like trying to sell 8 track tapes. No one wants them anymore, no one can afford them anymore, it makes no sense whats so ever to put money into your home which is just another depreciating asset. I'm considering semi retirement.
That said may I suggest to you OP and anyone else who is thinking of this wonderful field to just stop and read the writing on the wall. It says this: Construction related fields are dead, stone dead, and it ain't coming back for at least anther decade if it ever does. Pick another field. And the design field can include any number of specialized areas. To put it another way, when money is tight, the first thing people cut back on after entertainment is home improvements. Especially while their homes are losing more value then they even care to admit.
That all said, this is my basic duty as a Certified Kitchen Designer. I use a design program that cost about $5000 and $500 a year for the right to use it. I have done many kitchens worth in excess of $150,000 as well as thousands of the $3000 price range. Of 6000 kitchens, about 5500 were under $10,000. I'll take ten $10,000 kitchens over one $100,000 kitchen any day, any time, any place. The very expensive kitchens I did were for very very famous people you all know from TV and radio. Yea man they called little ol me for their kitchen!!!!
Many small Kitchen Cabinet Showrooms offer free basic design service. That don’t make the Designer a low life middle man during the entire process. The Designer earns their living by selling cabinets but are highly trained in how to make a kitchen work. The Designer does not disappear from your life once you hand them a check. The Designer keeps you informed as the cabinets are ordered, the due date, arranging for the installers to show, and any plumbers, electricians or other tradesmen that have to complete a task before the cabinets even show up. The Designer should be on the job site when the cabinets are delivered and supervise the Installers to be sure they do as the plans shows.
This is what I expect of my clients:
1. Be prepared to tell your Designer what your budget is. There is no sense in showing expensive cherry doors when you have an oak or maple budget.
2. Have pictures of kitchens you saw something in it that you like
3. Be prepared to change your mind because you will be introduced to things you never knew existed.
4. Be prepared to change your tastes. Designers come into your project with a fresh viewpoint and (hopefully) a lot of knowledge with ideas you may not have heard of.
5. Put function first, then looks. Your kitchen can be drop dead gorgeous but if you have to trip over the island to get to the oven then what good is it.
6. Expect to look at 3D drawings looking at your new kitchen from several angles.
7. Finally expect to get a firm price based on the drawing. Keep in mind any change will change the price. And many times the design is changed several times before it’s to your liking.
*Do not expect anyone to give you a price either by phone or just by walking in your door and looking.
*Do not accept a price per lineal foot from anyone. It is not even close to being accurate.
Most designers are not contractors, but their job includes guiding you through the process right to the end – and holding your hand when you need it.
Whew......longest post I ever did. But I hope I helped people understand our role.
Thanks for sharing your experiences. Its nice to read about where people are coming from. It gives you perspective when you read their posts.
There are many types of design. I hear your warning about entering the field, but I know of lots of viable work outside of the residential sector. There is commercial design, hospital and hospitality design, transportation sector, facilities management... all sorts of design going on out there. I do believe, though, that you have to do what you are passionate about. If I'm most passionate about residential, then I will certainly consider what you say about the market.
I know many corporate designers that are gainfully employed and there are positions available.
My dad was an interior designer for several years. I think I may have learned something even though our styles are different. My parents like "earth" tones and subdued colors. I tend to enjoy cooler colors.
I like houses that are beautiful and practical and use high-quality natural materials.
My decorating downfalls are that I have two tacky collections. I also love stark white. I love gilt.
Experience: I have decorated a French-style Victorian condo and "brownstone." I recently finished decorating a 3br rancher. All mine. I learned that you can put a boulder in a room with high ceilings, huge windows and plaster moldings and make it look good...but the rancher took a lot of planning to decorate.
My favorite decorating resources are Home Depot, Half Priced Drapes and Craigslist.
I've been in the business most of my life, I had wonderful mentors within my own family.
Lets see.......I have a Masters degree in Design from Washington University, I have been a practicing interior designer for over 20 years.
What do I love about what I do?
Well, for one thing, its about as much fun as I can possibly have while standing up.
Nuff said?
My dad was an interior designer for several years. I think I may have learned something even though our styles are different. My parents like "earth" tones and subdued colors. I tend to enjoy cooler colors.
I like houses that are beautiful and practical and use high-quality natural materials.
My decorating downfalls are that I have two tacky collections. I also love stark white. I love gilt.
Experience: I have decorated a French-style Victorian condo and "brownstone." I recently finished decorating a 3br rancher. All mine. I learned that you can put a boulder in a room with high ceilings, huge windows and plaster moldings and make it look good...but the rancher took a lot of planning to decorate.
My favorite decorating resources are Home Depot, Half Priced Drapes and Craigslist.
Wonderful story until you got to the favorite place for decorating resourses. What in hell does the Big Chinese Product Orange store have to decorate with? And by the time you pay their rape retail price what do you have to charge your poor customer? And Craigslist? I'm pretty sure you made a typing error there.
Other then that I too love the French Victorian style. I really love it!!! I also love the clothing from that era. Loving white is not a downfall by the way.....unless you do white kitchens.
My love of design started at an early age. I was always intrigued by architecture. My mother used to be amazed because even as a small child I would pick out details on a building. She said it was odd. lol. I credit my parents and not because they loved design its because they took zero pride in our home. My dad pretty much did every type of home improvement project half ass and my mother hated to be home or to clean. When I struck out on my own I realized I had a talent for putting things together. It meant something to me to live in clean and beautiful spaces. When I met my future husband he had just bought an abandoned house. I was amazed at the work he did in such a short time. He did the work well and we had a lot of fun designing the house together. We got married and our hobby was renovating homes. We have done it all.
I started out taking college courses in design. I loved it but then got talked into going into graphic design because interior design was dying out I was told. As much as I wished I would have stayed with it, I realize now it would have not been a good path with our current economic state. So I got my degree in graphic design, invested thousands into software and beefy computers only to realize it just another creative competitive field that is hard to make a living at. So I am back in school for business and hope to make a better living and pay some school loans off. I have pretty much given up the dream of doing something I love. I will leave that for my time off. Now my quest is to find something that I don't dread getting up in the morning for.
You will see a lot of us bickering on this site whether professional or not in the field but we all have the same thing in common. We are born artists and have a passion for design. We love to take something that doesn't work or is unattractive and make it beautiful and useful.
I think the hardest part for me is I have to be realistic with how the world is now. I would love to sink thousands into my home but the reality is, I have to be practical. I cannot over do my house because no one else is. I would love to renovate my kitchen but if I do, it needs to be inexpensive. The cabinets are in good shape but completely disappointing in how they function. Do I rip it out? Or do I slap new granite in so if I ever sell some twenty something yr old, will want to buy my house because due to the brain washing of HGTV, granite is standard and must have.
Who could out-Martha Stewart, before anyone knew who Martha Stewart was. She could paint, re-upholster, pick the classic piece out of a pile of junk, make pinch-peat draperies, build her own bed canopy, and tile a floor. Before breakfast.
Who could out-Martha Stewart, before anyone knew who Martha Stewart was. She could paint, re-upholster, pick the classic piece out of a pile of junk, make pinch-peat draperies, build her own bed canopy, and tile a floor. Before breakfast.
It was a major influence.
I have an aunt like that, she is amazing, she could do stuff with wallpaper that other people havent even discovered after all these years.
My design experience is redecorating my bedroom in high school and it looked like garbage. My apartment out of high school looked like garbage, My first home looked like the pages of Dwell magazine but after it was pulled from the landfill. My place in Hawaii looked wonderful because someone else did the design. So I learned that I have no design ability and I need help from those that do and I leave that to the pros. Not an answer to your question but a ray of hope that more like me will stop trying to do it ourselves.
So let me steal a phrase "Real men shouldn't try to decorate their own place!" (of course if post hang-over ikea modernizim comes into style, I may have a second career!)
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