The Design Process Breakdown
Hi friends, I figured I’d take some time today to share with you what a design process may look like in your own home. There are a few different scenarios we'll go into so you can get a feel for your options. I’ll explain a full room redesign, what a bathroom & kitchen redesign may look like and what a Designer for a Day scenario could look like. These are some of the most common ways to redesign your home without a full remodel. It's always good to know what the process should look like before making a final decision on how to upgrade your home. This helps you decide which path is best for you and what kind of Designer or Stylist you want to hire. All essentials to making the best choice for you, your home and your family.
So, let’s dig in!
Singular Room Design
We’ll start with a singular room redesign of the living room. The process will look the same for any bedroom, office, game room, man cave, or reading room you may have in your home. Once you know which room you'll be upgrading, you'll meet with the designers and stylists you’re considering so you can ensure you’re a proper fit for each other. For more details on that, refer back to Episode One where I discuss the difference in detail and why you’d want to hire anyone in the first place! Once that’s decided, you’ll sign a design agreement they supply and it’s off to the races!
We’ll talk through a full room redesign to cover the extent of the design process. This includes paint colors or wallpapering, window treatments, furniture, wall treatments, rugs, art, greenery and accessories. Some furniture pieces, art and accessories will be kept, the rest will be new.
From here we start with a walk-through of the space either virtually or in person to get a feel for it as it is now, and we’ll take pictures that capture the full room and its details from the starting point. All the measurements have to be taken from floor to ceiling and wall to wall so a scaled furniture plan can be created. If you’re in person, the designer or stylist will do this, but if you’re virtual, it’ll be you in charge of these steps and getting the info to them.
The designer can create a furniture plan which shows the pieces you’re keeping in their proper places in the room and allows them to fill in what they need, making sure it’ll fit the space available. This way you avoid purchasing a mistake that’s obnoxious to return. This also provides an easy way to see multiple ways to lay out a room without physically rearranging everything ten times. Nobody enjoys that. The designer will do it on paper and save yourself and hubby and sons or brothers a lot of effort! A furniture plan will also incorporate rug sizing and placement as well as any floor lamps or floor plants. During this time, the designer will call out the focal point of the room, so everything is properly oriented; for example, in the living room your focal point is your TV, maybe over a fireplace. In your bedroom, it’ll be the headboard wall, in your dining room, it’ll be either a large window or wall behind the table. The designer will use this information to place furniture to see the focal point clearly and properly dress up that space!
Ok, so you’ve got a finalized furniture plan. Amidst this process you’ve been looking at options for extra furniture so that the drawings can be up to date with your official selections to ensure everything does fit appropriately. If you’re virtual, it’ll all be things available online and if you’re in person you can go together to look for pieces you need in addition to viewing things online. You’ll need to trust your stylist to guide you in the best quality and pricing for everything, but if you love something, let them know so they can incorporate it!
During this process your designer will want to find an inspiration piece. It is what dictates your color palette which affects every selection you make. You want a rug, piece of large furniture, piece of artwork or maybe even curtains, to be your inspiration and include at least three colors; even if it’s all shades of grey and white. This needs to be placed where you can see it from almost anywhere in the room. The stylist will use this to help decide your furniture and soft good color options so it all coordinates beautifully.
The next step will be to pick the rug, the designer will already have the sizing necessary based upon the furniture layout. You can refer back to the post on Leveling Up Your Design where I discuss in further detail sizing requirements for rugs. The biggest point to keep in mind is that you want all the front legs of your seats to sit on the rug, this doesn’t include your TV stand. This way everything is grounded and your tv stand will likely sit 3-8" off the rug so it’s all in the right place. Your stylist will pick a style that goes well with your chosen design, works with or sets the color palette and is a suitable material for you.
Once furniture is in place and your rug has been selected, you can discuss what goes on the walls in terms of any wall treatments with wallpaper, trim and curtains. If you want to include trim or wall moldings, now is the time to decide it. There are so many fun options these days that I suggest searching Pinterest to see what you love and what you hate. Then you share those ideas with your stylist or designer so they can make a recommendation based upon your preference. If you have no idea what preference you have, then let them suggest something! Sometimes, the room doesn’t need it, especially if you’re going for a modern, clean look. But this is where it’s best to decide now because next is whether or not you want to use wallpaper anywhere. Wallpaper is back in a strong fashion and it’s much easier to work with now than it was even ten or twenty years ago. Ask your stylist or designer where they feel a good location would be because wallpaper is so versatile it really can be used with every single style out there. You can find something that is a subtle texture or pattern which adds dimension to the room but blends in color wise. You can also find options that make a bold statement in your room and act as the art for the space. However, if you have no interest in wallpaper or moldings, then you move onto curtains.
You also have a lot of options here due to the vast inventory of what’s available. Curtains can make a bold statement and be used as your inspiration piece or keep things simple as a soft finishing touch to the room. Your designer will ensure the colors fit into your color palette and be mindful of any patterning to use. You don’t want to pick a style that conflicts with the rest of your room, so rely on your stylist or designer for this. The biggest thing to keep in mind is the height and width of your curtain placement. For the best look they will be hung in a single-story home either at the ceiling or 3-6" below the ceiling, you also want to go wide enough that when your curtains are open, they don’t block any sunlight from coming in. A lot of times you’ll have blinds or shades on your windows, and you’ll find that you never close the curtains. In this case, you don’t need a full curtain rod, but can create stationary panels on either side and your designer can create a valance over top to complete the frame. If you choose to go with plantation shutters, you don’t need curtains at all as those create a complete window treatment on their own.
A stylist who really knows their stuff can take it a step further and draw up an elevation. An elevation drawing shows the wall as you’re looking at it and where everything goes. You would use this for a feature wall where there’s maybe a mounted TV and entertainment system around it or a gallery wall to show where every piece goes. This makes the install day go much smoother when you have a dimensioned drawing showing each pieces hang location, and again, you don’t have to have people holding things up and moving it around physically. Let the designer do it all on paper and save yourself the time and effort, although, you don’t have to worry about a few extra nail holes that are easily covered if something doesn’t come out the way you love it the first time.
Lastly, the designer will pick a wall color. You might be surprised that this comes last, but there are a million paint options and nothing else is as vast in variety. Once the more selective items are chosen, you can find paint to coordinate with everything.
Redesigning a Bathroom or Kitchen
Next, we'll cover what it looks like to focus in on a bathroom or kitchen redesign. These are different because it includes more than just furniture and paint colors. You have to consider cabinetry, countertops, light fixtures, plumbing, appliances, tiles and accessories. The same basic flow starts with a couple conversations to determine what exactly needs to be changed. I want to call back to an earlier episode where I discussed the difference between an Interior Designer & Interior Stylist/Decorator. If you’re having renovation work done, you’ll want someone licensed doing the big work for you that has insurance. In my case as a Stylist, I would visit the cabinet store with you to make selections in terms of door styles and color. You would hire a licensed general contractor to then install it all for you. Same with moving any electrical or plumbing. If you just want to switch out a light fixture, that’s not always a big deal if you don’t change anything inside the walls.
The same process applies for countertops, appliances, tiles, and plumbing fixtures. We’ll go to the store or review the online options, you’ll pick your favorite that best coordinates with my design plan. I’d consult with the sales rep’s at each store to make sure we select the most suitable material and size for each area. You then have a licensed general contractor or whomever each store supplies to install each of the items you’ve selected.
This process involves more elevation and tile drawings, so the installers know what goes where after we’ve had an in-depth discussion of the layout and desired design in the space. A detailed drawing will show things like where the tile begins and ends, how many pieces we need in each area, if we want to do a fun accent tile in the shower and where it belongs. It also specifically shows the items selected, calls out grout color, color of finishes, sizing and all the fun technical stuff the professionals need to know for proper installation.
After all of the hard finishes are complete, then we get to pick rugs, curtains, art, kitchen stools, bathroom accessories and paint colors in order to complete the space. The order is the same as above in a full room redesign. Once again, everything gets approved by you ahead of time so that you know you’re going to love the end result. At the end of install day, we do a happy dance to celebrate your beautiful upgrade!
An important note to make when you’re working on a larger project like a kitchen or bathroom redesign that involves contractors, you have to watch your timeline carefully. Making decisions promptly is very important in order to avoid delaying the process. Now, if something is in short supply, back stock or any other fun supply chain issue we’ve had these last couple of years, that is out of your hands. But picking between the two or three options a stylist or designer gives you is critical and in your capable hands. If you find that you simply can’t decide, trust your designer or stylist to make the best selection for the overall design they’ve been working on for you. This is a big reason why feeling comfortable with the stylist or designer is crucial to having a great design at the end of the day.
Designer for a Day
Lastly is the Designer for a Day scenario, I just did this impromptu a couple weekends ago for a friend to try it out and had such a fun time of it! In this scenario, you once again have an initial conversation about the scope of the project and what you want to see happen in your space. In my case, it was mainly the furniture layout in the front sitting room. They didn’t like their original layout, had tried moving things around and found it was worse than before, but they didn’t know what other options they had. I was able to have that conversation ahead of time with her and I’d already been in her space a couple times to have a feel for what was there and what items they were keeping or willing to get rid of/hide somewhere else in the house.
This process moves pretty quickly, depending on how much of the home is changing. In our case, we took maybe an hour to complete a quick layout change, shuffle some art around and then we discussed what her next steps were once they had the budget to make some changes. I wish I had some photos of before and after to show you, but honestly, I got so caught up in the moment that I forgot till afterwards. I’ll try and briefly describe the scenario for you, however, to get a better idea of what this looks like.
When you walk in the house, the first room to your right is their front sitting room. They have two couches, two armchairs, a rug, two substantial bookcases, a couple pieces of art on the wall, two different sized coffee tables and a corner display case. The only things that actually matched were the bookcases, the rest were all hand-me-downs and collections from over the years that they want to keep just a little longer while their son is so young and a tad bit messy as all toddlers are.
The rug sat in the middle of the room, and they had one couch against the far wall. The second couch sat opposite it with the coffee table in between, but it was floating in the middle of the rug, which the first couch didn't even touch. The bookcases flanked the bay window on the front of the house to the right of the couches and the art was in the only two locations possible, one behind the couch on the wall and one to the left of the floating couch. The corner display case was again in the only spot possible just to the left when you walked in the room, near that piece of art.
The first thing I did was take time to mull over everything I was looking at and visually move it around in my head. Some things were pretty obviously creating the disfunction in the room and I knew my limitations. Fortunately, the room is large, and well suited for everything they actually had so we didn’t remove any furniture pieces, in fact, I brought in a small console table to help complete the space.
I tweaked the rug to be fully centered in the room on the bay window. We adjusted the couches so that only the front two legs were on the rug and the back two legs were not. This meant that when you walked into the house and looked to your right, you saw the back of one couch, a coffee table centered on the rug, and the other couch faced you. These couches floated in the middle of the room, not touching any walls, and it worked because they were both grounded on the rug.
Next, I shifted the armchairs around and set them both in the bay window, facing the couches. I placed the smaller coffee table between the two with a plant on it. I didn’t move that display case or the bookshelves flanking the bay window because it wasn’t necessary, I did however ensure we had adequate walkway to access everything on the bookshelves and wouldn’t bump into the display case as you walked between it and the couch. We were all set there.
We walked through the house’s main areas and looked at all the art they had. This was when I discovered the small console table that was in the way of a recliner in their living room. I grabbed it and a mirror and took them to the front sitting room. Centered behind the couch on the far wall of the room, I told her to hang the mirror there and put the table beneath it. On the table now sits a small lamp, vase with flowers and decorative piece of art/bowl. We picked another picture that had a stark yellow mat around the art, and I recommended she switch that out for a subtle black one. This way the art wasn’t so bright and offensive to the eyes and could actually blend in with the general color palette that was forming with the furniture she had.
The last thing I did was recommend getting a couple things reupholstered since she has a seamstress in the family. I offered some choices of colors based upon the one couch that really didn’t need to change, this way, she can upgrade her furniture and keep it cohesive.
Now, a few weeks later they still love it! Of course, they want to change some fabrics, finish hanging the art and mirror, but the functionality is freeing, and they’re no longer stressed when they see their front sitting room, they are excited because they can visualize where it will end up. It was a satisfying experience for all and I’m very excited to offer this service for those with a more restrictive budget, who need to take more time to redesign the room but want to feel a little bit better about it today.
The Conclusion
I hope all this was truly informative for you to see more detail about what goes into a redesign, how it should flow for a smooth process and the satisfaction that can come at the end of it all. Truly, redesigning your home is more than picking pretty art and paint colors, it’s about creating functionality that is livable, beautiful and sustainably designed so you don’t have to re-do everything in a couple of years. In the long run, it saves you time and money to hire a professional and do things right from the get-go. I hope you feel more empowered to make that choice today.