Don’t get discouraged use simple solutions
Discouragement comes in many forms! Site deterioration! Unwelcome surprises! Unrealistic cost estimates! The list is long… And, throughout the path of any interior design project, no venue is immune. Stuff happens, and depending on the management expertise in charge of your project, it can be handled with appropriate solutions, or it can create chaos.
There are very serious reasons for having an Interior design project manager/coordinator who knows their experiential way around Interior design projects.
Treating your project like just a grown-up hobby, or believing you might be able to handle it alone — guided by those fabulous glossy mag feature articles — could unwittingly plunge you into confusion and costly mistakes.
It’s not about accusing you of being an incompetent amateur! It’s about the complexity of something that can look incredibly simple!
One of the biggest miscalculations and misunderstandings — when considering an Interior design project — is cost. Not far behind are the challenges of reasonable and affordable access to all of the appropriate elements. There is the wide range of choice; essential information needed before decisions can be made with confidence and the reasonable and correct installation expertise that makes it all go together.
The last thing you would want, concerning your Interior design project, would be to suddenly feel overwhelmed and discouraged.
It could come from almost any direction when trying to coordinate unfamiliar factors. Most of us can learn new skills and make our way through new territory — with the right set of directions — and some guidance and relevant information concerning resources. Making the assumption that such assistance is out of reach or prohibitive, can set you up for exactly what you fear!
Often, professional Interior designers are brought in to a project that has become bogged down — usually because of fairly simple confusions or frustrations that may relate to unfamiliarity with coordination of all the elements that pull the project together.
“Do-it-yourself” is not the enemy! It’s just that doing all of almost anything “yourself,” seldom applies to complex renovation, restoration, refreshment or new construction Interior projects. It’s just not the nature of the beast! There are numerous interdependent aspects, each connected to another part of the desired harmony for the finished project.
I have discovered over many years of experience that what most clients mean by “do it myself” relates to being in charge of their project, being the manager, making all final decisions and maintaining the control. Now, that makes sense!
The smartest do-it-yourself person is the one who knows what they don’t know, knows when and where to get the right guidance concerning what they don’t know, and has full control over their project precisely because they choose becoming informed over discouragement and frustration!
Most professional Interior designers offer very broad choices of ways to access their services. Most begin their connections (with a possible, future client) by discussing your envisioned project. They will want to hear what you want and may offer suggestions as to the feasibility.
They will want to understand your financial parameters for the project and can offer insights as to how realistic your assumptions or estimates are — from their experience.
Often, such preliminary conferences have no cost, but can greatly help the prospective party to get their ideas into perspective.
Discouragement is most often about misinformation, not enough information, assumptions instead of facts and incorrect beliefs about cost and time. Those — of course — can lead to frustration, cancellation of the whole idea and other ugly conclusions.
Don’t stomp on your own Interior design dreams! Have a conversation with your local Interior design expert — you might be pleasantly surprised!
Robert Boccabella, B.F.A. is principal and founder of Business Design Services and a certified interior designer (CID) in private practice for over 30 years. Boccabella provides Designing to Fit the Vision© in collaboration with writingservice@earthlink.net. To contact him call 707-263-7073; email him at rb@BusinessDesignServices.com or visit www.BusinessDesignServices.com or on Facebook at Business Design Services.