FEATURED ON THIS EPISODE:

JOIN THE WAIT LIST FOR MY REVAMPED COURSE, THE DESIGNER’S EDGE

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

WHY YOUR ROLE AS A DESIGNER GOES FAR BEYOND AESTHETICS

HOW TO SPOT AND SOLVE THE SMALL DESIGN GAPS THAT ARCHITECTS AND CONTRACTORS OFTEN MISS

HOW TO COLLABORATE WITHOUT SHRINKING

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Projects get completed every day without our expertise, I am sorry to say, but we are simply a luxury service; but the good news is, we’re a luxury service – so we get brought on for specific reasons.

One of which is our ability to elevate any design, customizing it to our client’s specific needs, of that moment. 

And I say, of that moment, because I have worked with clients for more than a decade and their lives have evolved. And what we do is specific to our industry. I worked with a couple who had children in middle school all the way up until they were empty nesters. 

I say specific to our industry because in my experience, architects and contractors do not view a home the same way we do. I don’t want any of you to think that you are secondary on a project if there’s an architect on the team. 

If you are on the project, your client is signaling that they expect the design to be elevated from start to finish with your guidance. And we absolutely can deliver on that, every single time.

Here’s where I see it fall apart:

When we defer to much to plans as if they are untouchable. Or let’s say we are brought in later than we like and we feel like it’s too late to speak up, or tiptoe around the details thinking it’s too small to matter or no one will really care. And that’s just not true.

A lighting placement or switch location matters once the project ends. 

When a client walks through a room and it doesn’t serve their need, then on some level, it’s failed because our clients are hiring us to see these things for them.

Here’s the thing I run into, there is a very big difference between code and custom.

Architectural plans do exactly what they’re supposed to do. They meet code, they lay out rooms, they produce the program that the client has detailed and they create the structure of the home. They go a step further and put in millwork, aesthetic details, and work on the flow of the rooms. 

But do you know what they don’t always do? They don’t always reflect the real life of that specific client. 

That’s not a dig at an architect. It’s just not what most of them are trained to do. That’s where we step in. The best way I can describe the difference between an interior designer and an architect is an architect views the house from the outside looking in. We interior designers, we view a house from the inside out.

And what we really excel at is understanding our clients and how they live now, and how they want to live in this new space. 

Now I know we’re not always brought in on day one, and maybe the plans are already done, but if you’re working for the client, the client brought you on, they are looking for your expertise with construction. Therefore, you are obligated to share your thoughts. 

My personal experience finding a place for my client’s dog bed 

I share in today’s episode about a client who needed a space for a dog bed. At every client meeting we’d be in the kitchen and the dog would always be in there laying in it’s dog bed. They were dog people and talked about their dog often and the dog clearly had a place in the kitchen. 

They handed me the plans, saying, here ya go Renee, here are the plans. Not, they’re in the works, just here are the plans. And there was no place for a dog bed in the kitchen.

So I brought it up. Simply because you can bet the very first person they’ll be frustrated with, after they moved in, would have been me. 

And honestly, that’s fair, because it’s our job to close those loops, to catch the things no one else has thought of, to advocate for the end result our clients are hoping for and paying for, even if they can’t and especially if they can’t articulate it. 

Our work bridges the space between a blueprint and human behavior, or in this case, canine behavior. 

It is about the little things, and they are not insignificant. 

I can promise you clients do not know how to articulate what they want, but they know when something feels off in the end and they absolutely know when you made their home feel effortless.

But again, I can’t say it enough, you are in collaboration, not competition with the architect or the builder. There’s this idea that if we’re asking questions or making suggestions, then we’re stepping on toes. That is not true, and certainly not if we approach it in the right way. 

We are not there to undo anyone’s work; that’s not what this is about. We’re there to make it all work together. 

I have found that when you show up with respect and clarity, most architects actually appreciate it. Of course, there will be some who will feel you are threatening their designs. You cannot control that, but you work for the client. 

When you step into that role of connecting the floor plan to real life, you create a more confident client, and that turns into a smoother construction process, a more elevated usable home, and ultimately a more profitable firm for yourself. 

But to me, probably the most important thing you build is trust – with your client, with the architect, and with he contactor. Because the work we do turns a house into a home, and that’s the experience your client signed up for.