Interior Design is Dead!

And no, this isn’t a trend. In fact, I am emphatically “anti-trend”. Basically I believe that the bar has been raised for interior designers, because these days it’s just not enough to study design in school and sell furnishings from your favorite vendor. The overall process appeal is lost. And it definitely doesn’t come across authentically to those clients wanting a unique home and lifestyle. I strongly believe that great home styling is done through careful behavioral analysis, psychology, planning, development, study, tracking and flawless delivery. In other words, you need a great eye for detail and the overall process takes time and effort.

To illustrate my point, just look at how many divergent interior design shows are on television today. Some focus on color, others on furniture arrangements, and some on simply recreating a picture of a room on a budget (low cost/high style). What we sometimes fail to consider is the real impact of the design on the people that live there. Do we ever know the details about how they want to live or feel when the design job is finished? What happens when the cameras are gone and people use the space? I’d love to see a show where they revisit a home that was done on the cheap to find out how it’s really working (or not).

In my opinion, what makes a house a home is being able to enhance or remove something from your surroundings until you feel the way your surroundings encourage you to feel. For example, I want my studio to encourage creativity and I want my bedroom to encourage rest and relaxation. I’ve said it before… great designers don’t just decorate; they style a room around a style of life.

A really awesome designer is able to help people reach into their memories and pull out details that will recreate special places and times. Resist conventional, mainstream ideas about how you should furnish your home. Create unique and interesting living spaces for yourself; both at home and at work. Work with a design team that specializes in you. Defy the nonsense about quick makeovers. And don’t work with people who are out to turn a profit quickly and leave you with a bunch of trendy new accessories and rearranged furniture. In the end, make sure your home makes a connection to you and your lifestyle.

People in the design field must do more to elevate the overall idea of creating a lifestyle at home. To do anything less than this is to ensure the death of interior design as we know it today.