Dear Interior Designers, Someone Else Is Doing Your Job
Dear interior designers,
Someone else is doing your job. The pandemic has revealed an underlying truth in our industry: when push comes to shove, someone else can step in and do your job for you. As COVID layoffs continue to occur, we can see a consolidation taking place, where design decisions are passed off to architects, contractors, or even clients. Witnessing this change was the impetus that led me to write this article, where I reexamine the value proposition of designers as a group and of design as a concept. What is the value-add of design, why are designers necessary, and what is lost when design professionals are no longer part of the equation? Those are the questions I will be addressing in this article.
While allowing other kinds of professionals to do the work of interior designers seems perplexing, this undervaluation of interior design did not come out of nowhere. The underlying disconnect is that many people, even in our own industry, do not understand the difference between interior design and interior decoration. An interior designer’s contributions go far beyond aesthetics. It is true that an architect, contractor, or client can choose paint colors and furniture, but it is both false and dangerous to assume that creating visual appeal is all interior designers do.
A good place to dive into the important contributions of interior designers is sustainability. In a very real way, the responsibility for sustainable outcomes lies with interior designers. Since embodied carbon (carbon in the materials that make up a building) is now a larger factor in a building’s environmental impact than operational carbon (carbon stemming from building operations like heating and cooling), achieving a high level of sustainability depends on interior designers specifying sustainable materials. The repository of knowledge in this area lies with the designers, allowing them to understand the complex tradeoffs that go into maximizing sustainability. Without this knowledge, it is far too easy for clients to dismiss sustainable alternatives as too expensive or difficult to source, leading to undesirable outcomes.
Human behavior is another area of knowledge that can fall by the wayside without interior designer input. Designers are trained to think about problems from an experiential and behavioral point of view. This kind of problem-solving can improve wayfinding, encourage users to make good choices, and create spaces that are more natural to use. But even more importantly, an understanding of human behavior can provide greater accessibility across user demographics. Thinking through an experience from the perspective of an octogenarian might reveal a need for more handrails and improved lighting. Considering the perspective of an immigrant might reveal a need for pictorial or multilingual wayfinding. And taking the perspective of a child might reveal a need to lower certain features, improving visual and physical access.
Research is a third critical area that is usually the purview of interior designers. Certain interiors research is foundational to a successful design; one prominent example from healthcare is the fact that more natural light in hospital rooms leads to statistically more positive outcomes. While finding applicable research findings is important, the on-the-job research that interior designers conduct is just as valuable. I can’t even count the number of times I have changed a design based on stakeholder input. Any future user of the space, whether a customer, employee, or member of the maintenance staff, can provide important feedback that allows designs to effectively meet the needs of more people. Interior designers know how to conduct stakeholder interviews and analyze collected data, uncovering the requirements that support positive design interventions.
A final impact of good interior design is long-term positive outcomes, and by extension, client satisfaction. An interior designer’s niche knowledge cannot be replicated easily. Take carpet for example. In many settings, choosing the correct carpet is essential. Consider schools, hospitals, and airports; the physical requirements can be demanding, and standards are commensurately stringent. While working on these kinds of projects, I have participated in marathon phone call sessions to get the right information, talking to numerous product reps over the course of several hours. On an average call, I might ask about whether the carpet uses nylon six or nylon six-six, whether the backing is latex or polyurethane, and whether solution or stock dyeing was employed. These factors influence the durability and colorfastness of the product, so even though anyone can pick a pretty carpet, ask an interior designer to do it if you want to avoid an angry phone call from your client a couple years down the line when their carpet looks worn and faded.
In our industry, we need to value interior designers more highly for what they bring to projects. It’s true that a project can be completed even without an interior designer, but the shortcomings will become apparent very quickly. Sustainable outcomes will not be maximized, accessibility will suffer, research that could have informed the process will be missing, and serious issues may crop up down the line if there were miscalculations in material specification. The value of interior designers cannot be understated, and we need to change the perception that their contributions are solely aesthetic. Because while someone else might be doing your job, only you can do it well.
