10% Inspiration (FUN) vs 90% Paperwork (UGH)
I remember the very first day of classes to become an interior designer, my favorite instructor, Sherry Shroyer (now gone but not forgotten) uttered this phrase, ” Design is 10 % inspiration and 90% supporting that inspiration with paperwork. If that doesn’t sound like fun to you, there is the door!” Seriously? What had I gotten myself into? Frankly, I had chosen to be an interior designer because law school would take too long, in my estimation, and I was no spring chicken then.
At forty-two years young I had decided that I needed to make a living for myself facing divorce and having been a former award-winning artist, I figured interior design was my thing….after all I had been helping all of my friends for years with advice. Now, theoretically, I could charge a fee for what I had been giving away for years.
All these years later I can say that what Sherry spoke that day was prophetic. For all of those out there who think that fun or glamour plays a big part in this business must know that this is business and glamour, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
Ain’t no glamour in schlepping dining chairs into a new home on the Arizona desert in July when it is 115 degrees and your mascara is melting off in jagged trickles down your cheeks. To get those chairs here in the first place took many calls to vendors for pricing, finding out when the fabric was delivered to the manufacturer and why the heck they aren’t here in AZ when they were promised two weeks ago…because the client is having the birthday party of the decade in three days and she wants her chairs! This business is not for sissies or the faint of heart!!!!!!
I am grateful for Google, CAD, spell check, cell phones, design software and a decent sense of humor. That said, the Oregon design contract is about done and in the mail. The paper work continues…..
