Dip arts interior design
Where did you start as a designer?
I started professionally in 1990. I had been doing it a bit before then. I had a retail outlet in Bridge Road Richmond. I started trying to sell retail and getting jobs on the side. I used the retail to show off the things that I could do.
Was it always a passion?
I have always liked and enjoyed design. I fell into it rather than purposely making an effort. I started doing designing for people I knew and started to have some success. Before I went out on my own I had done a restaurant with no budget and also a hairdressing salon for a very minimal budget which went ok. I also did an apartment which received some publicity.
So all the magazines on the walls are your interiors?
Most of them are very very old (laughs). When I was younger I always chased publicity. I felt that media was the best way to gain exposure. At the time I felt I had a marketable look. I was in my early 30’s and was doing very traditional things which were popular at the time, that no one else of my age was doing. That gave me an angle because most of the people who were doing traditional interiors were over fifty. It seemed to work and the media picked up on it. The first ten years were great with media.
What’s it like being a designer in Melbourne? Is it an exciting and contemporary environment to be a designer in? What is the design focus in Melbourne, describe its design culture?
I work in a different world to what you are seeing in the magazines at the moment. I do high-end private work. It’s something that you see internationally but you don’t see a lot here. We are not in the same market as a lot of the contemporary designers around that do contemporary furniture and fit-outs. It’s hard because there is not the product to buy. You have to have an inventive mind and look at customising a lot of things and trying to import things. That’s a downside. It’s also a very small market so you have to continually change because you are only ever one degree of separation away from the last client you worked with.
Is your market centralised in just a few suburbs?
I think it’s map 59 (laughs) which we tend not to go off. I work in limited areas where I’m very well known. Then you cross the road and no one knows who you are.
How would you describe Melbourne’s design culture?
Its hard because I don’t feel like im a part of it. But I think its very modern and fad driven. It’s fleeting, most of the market is here then gone… It’s a current look, I wouldn’t say it’s the future or the past.
What is your design strategy? Describe your work across interior and furniture.
For a start, we do family homes, so we don’t really do design statements. Our philosophy is that we do comfortable family homes. The most important thing in a house is that it offers some type of emotion rather than be the most cutting edge or current look. I always think a house where you feel before you look is very important. Our houses are very comfort driven and classic. We aren’t modern but we aren’t old fashioned. We use warm colours because its not a really hot climate and we are natural material orientated. I like things that are recognisable materials. We tend not to use plastics or high-tech products. We like natural and handcrafted things. The market for me is all about hand made, bespoke and one-offs. It’s not selecting from retail catalogues.
Do you think people chose aesthetics over comfort in a lot of more contemporary homes?
Often you see people who are looking for what’s new and they want to be current. They buy a look and when they stand in it, it bears no relevance to who they are, where they have been or what sort of lifestyle they lead. I think it’s a bit of an issue. Because the magazines say ‘I need to have this’, we have got to have it. It’s not about assessing whether it suits our personality or our life. For instance the term “family room”. People need a big family room, but they don’t have a big family. It ends up being this big open space that they feel really uncomfortable in, when they would really like a small room with books and dogs where they can be comfortable and watch T.V. with the family.
What are your main considerations as a designer?
We have a list of assessments that we use to categorise our clients. We have to work out who we are working for and then we try to change and suit that person. We get people to understand why they have come to us and if they
have made the right choice. We then change who we are to suit those people.
Do many people give you a free reign because they like your previous works?
Yes, some. You get to know them and they don’t give you a brief. But you have to try to extrapolate the brief out of them. That comes with experience. In that situation you can just go for it and we have a pretty high strike rate of presenting things that they will like. We also have other clients where they are the ones controlling everything and we are trying to hold it together. We change all the time.
Is creativity and intuition a large part of your practice? Do you think design can be a more rigid and structured process nowadays?
I think it’s intuition. I’m involved in the colleges and you see a lot of kids who are coming through and doing the process and they are very good at it. But you don’t walk in and see an inner something about them. Having an edge is innate and it comes from the person.
Who do you look up to as designers? Who do you gain inspiration from?
I like so much. I see everything as inspiration. There are lots of designers from the thirties and forties who I really like. People like Billy Baldwin and John Fowler. I am very influenced by architecture and relating to it. I think architecture comes first and decoration comes second. My favourite architect is Edwin Luytens. My favourite designer is from the sixties, Cavid Hicks. He was very instrumental in taking antique furniture and covering it in bright orange or red. Or taking an old Georgian building and lacquering the walls purple. He is a big influence on me.
How much bearing does the building have on your process?
I believe the building tells you what to do. A lot of people are unrealistic about what their building can do. An interior is just like a stage set. You are making a set for people to act out their lives. If you give them the right setting they are going to feel more comfortable and happy and act out the role that they want to play. You also have to take budget into consideration. You then have to assess all that criteria. You don’t say “this is my look and I’m going to do it”. You are always having to alter and change to suit all of the criteria.
Is it hard to forge your own style when each client Is so different?
When people want to see what you have done you try not to show them because they might look at something and think it’s terrible. But it was done to suit someone else’s personality and brief. Australians see things really personally. They aren’t objective. They don’t see things and say ‘that is a good example of that style’. They look and say “I hate that” because they can’t step out of their own comfort zone.
What are the current trends in your industry?
I think that the modernists have had a really good run over the last 15 years. I think that the traditional furniture I was doing when I first started will never come back again. I think it’s irrelevant; the market has moved on. What people are really looking for now is personality. They want to walk into a home and see someone’s life rather than a beautifully decorated piece that could be a display. People want to mix things up. Have things from other cultures. It’s a mix of classic next to primitive. I think that’s where we are going. I think people are looking for refined and simple spaces to put these diverse collections in.
