15/10/2009 by admin.

A year on…

I cannot believe that a year has passed since I began my professional interior design course at KLC! I’ve completed 3 projects, plus a mock exam and learnt lots of the history of style.

Have just spent a week learning to use Vectorworks and I am happily say its fabulous! I’m a bit of a techie anyway, so no surprise to me really, although I still like drawing plans from scratch too. Just need someone to download some sketching skills into my brain. I think the problem is that I like things to look finished. The idea of including something I thought up on the back of a beer mat is abhorrent to me. Still, looks like I need to get over that so I can help show my thought process more clearly.

Project 4

We’ve finally been given our first live project! Very excited indeed. Basic task is to design a living area (with incorporated home office bit), kitchen, utility room and WC. Lots to get my teeth into. This all seemed great until someone pointed out that it’s only 14 weekends until Christmas (you know who you are…). Aaah. As I have a full-time job, this could be a problem…

Oh well, I have ploughed on head first into ordering gazillions of books, raiding the local market for last month’s magazines (I love you!)  and ordering brochures by the bucket load.

One potential issue that may present itself is that fact that one half of the client (the man obviously) is a minimalist. The other half is clearly not. How on earth do I satisfy both?! One not a fan of pattern, other loves some elements of crazy Scandinavian designs.

[caption id=”attachment_203″ align=”alignnone” width=”270″ caption=”Art Pillows from Design House Stockholm”][/caption]

We were lucky enough to go and survey the house in question and also speak to the structural engineer working on extending the back and side of the house (so it’s full width and continues out into the garden a little more). Little difficult to do a survey when there’s 20-odd people in the way, but I think we got there in the end. 

As I started to order books to help with the concept stage of the design process, I suddenly remembered that I was member of the Shoe Lane Library close to my work. Turns out you can reserve books online, and if they haven’t got them, they’ll transport them from another library in their group. i.e. Shoe Lane is part of the City of London libraries and therefore has access to all their library catalogues. Plus, Kent libraries do exactly the same! Something tells me I’ve been missing out for years and could’ve saved myself loads of money. Some of the books were actually published in 2009 too, so they’re not all dusty 1970s nightmares either.

Speaking of vintage, the female half of the client loves 50s/60s Danish design. At last something we agree on! Will be interesting to see how it all turns out…

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16/09/2009 by admin.

In the US, Interior Designers have to attend uni and then be licensed to provide professional services. In Blighty however, the situation is somewhat different.

When I tell people I’m training to be an interior designer, their general response appears to be “Ooh that’s nice. Your home must be lovely. Can you come shopping with me sometime and pick some stuff?”. This is nice and everything, but I don’t quite think people understand what level of technical ability is involved, and that it’s not just about picking out nice cushions.

Thankfully BIID (which I am a member of incidentally) have a nice handy definition of an Interior Designer which is:

“The Association defines interior designers as persons qualified by training and experience to plan and supervise the design and execution of interiors and their furnishings, and to organise the various arts and crafts essential to their completion. The professional interior designer provides a full consultancy service.A designer is a person, qualified by education, experience and recognised skills, who identifies, researches and creatively solves problems pertaining to the function and quality of the interior environment; and performs services relative to interior spaces including programming, design analysis, space planning, aesthetics, and inspection of work on-site, using specialised knowledge of interior construction, building systems and components, building regulations, equipment, materials and furnishings; and prepares drawings and documents relative to the design of interior space.”

This is fundamentally different to the defintiton of an Interior Decorator which is:

“An Interior Decorator can give advice on entire decorative schemes, including furnishing and furniture, but will not enter into building contracts or supervisory contracts.”

The course I am studying is a professional course which can only call itself so because it includes the following:

1. Fundamentals of Design (philosophy, sociology, aesthetics and a theory of design). Visual research (colour, light, form, texture). Basic knowledge of materials.
2. Visual Communication (objective and interpretative drawing, freehand perspective drawing, use of colour media, photography and model making).
3. People in their Environment (human ergonometric and anthropometric studies and people in space and design evaluation). History of Art and Architecture, Interiors and Furniture.
4. Creative work by Project Method.
5. Interpretation of the project schemes and technical studies related to the built environment (working drawings, building technology, and understanding of structure and services. Costing and estimating, detailing and specifying material, furniture and fittings).
6. Professional Practice (verbal communication techniques, office organisation and practice, legislation affecting the designer, visiting projects underway or completed).

* The standards set by the International Federation of Interior Architects/Interior Designers (IFI) are recognised by the Association. The BIDA is an Associate member of the IFI.

So dearest friends and family, next time you ask me how my course is going, bear in mind that it is actually bloody hard work and that I’m not just playing about with bits of fabric and making cushions (I can’t even sew).

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23/08/2009 by admin.

I’ve been quiet on the blogging/twittering front for a while as I’ve been finalising Project 3 for college which is an extensive Curtains, Textiles and Soft Furnishings Notebook. I don’t think the word ‘notebook’ is nearly grand enough to describe the vast quantity of information, fabric samples and pictures I’ve had to gather over recent months! My poor eyes are starting to fall out of my head as I’ve been staring at this screen for evenings and weekends on end just typing descriptions about curtain suspension and fabric composition.

I’m not complaining…

I didn’t quite realise there were so many types of curtain headings out there! If you want to know more about pole drapery, I am now your woman.

Having difficulty deciding between an Austrian or Festoon blind? Call on me.

[caption id=”attachment_194″ align=”alignnone” width=”465″ caption=”Austrian blind vs…”][/caption]

[caption id=”attachment_195″ align=”alignnone” width=”480″ caption=”…Festoon blind?”][/caption]

And if you need someone to design a portiere (that’s door curtian to you) for you, I can point you in the right direction.

What I did find extremely difficult was finding decent images of such treatments. Google and Yahoo image searches tend to come up with the same image again and again, in varying sizes. My favourite magazines seem to have endless pages of rooms that are far too trendy for windows treatments as they are full of those big glass boxes. Plus some treatments are completely unknown in a search engine, or in the case of blinds, come up with pictures of blind people (no offence, but unless there’s a window behind you, it’s no help to me).

If I end up with a decent mark, I may even end up sharing the finished product with you at a later date. here’s hoping…

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