- Decorating Buckingham Palace West
If you are decorating a very elaborate home, in the $1,000,000.00 range, you may wish to hire
an interior designer.
A one-of-a-kind home deserves one-of-a-kind furnishings. If it seems reasonable to you to spend $1,000,000.00 on a home, then it would probably also
seem reasonable to you to spend $25,000.00 on an custom designed sofa or $50,000.00 on hand-painted wallpaper. Of course, if this is the category
you fall into, you probably don't read consumer books like this one.
An interior designer can create unique custom window treatments, upholstery, and other furnishings. Your designer can also obtain unusual and
ultra-exclusive fabrics, wallpapers, rugs, and other furnishings for you. Homes in this range often contain art collections or unusual architectural
elements which require customized lighting to show them off properly.
There is a proper place for interior designers, and this is it. This exactly the kind of job they have been trained to do.
- Decorating a historic home
Interior designers receive extensive education in historical periods of art, furniture, textiles, and other home furnishings. If you are restoring
the interior of a historic home, you will want to make sure that the furnishings are correct and historically appropriate.
This type of specialized information is not readily available to the average consumer. This is another situation where an interior designer's training
is needed and well worth the expense.
- Saving time
A few people, usually in very highly paid professions, have more money than they have time. An interior designer can save you a great deal of legwork
when selecting home furnishings. They can do all of the browsing through showrooms and then bring a few samples to you to make your final selection.
They do charge big bucks for this service, however. Usually, these services run at least $100.00 per hour from a well-established designer, plus a
percentage of the furnishings' cost. Top designers charge thousands of dollars PER DAY for their time.
If you can make more than $100.00 per hour by investing your time elsewhere, then hiring an interior designer could be cost-effective for you.
- Having access to ultra-exclusive merchandise
If you want to purchase ultra-exclusive merchandise, hiring an interior designer is the only way to go. I mean that literally, not figuratively.
The manufacturers and artists who produce these ultra-exclusive fabrics, wallpapers, furniture, and other home furnishings have gone to great lengths
to ensure that this merchandise cannot be purchased any other way. The added trouble and expense of acquiring these things is apparently intended to
add to the furnishings' value.
If you want to purchase ultra-exclusive, $1000.00 per yard, even-the-Queen-of-England-doesn't-have-it fabrics or an ultra-exclusive dining room table
made out of elk horns by a furniture "artist", you will have to pay an interior designer an additional commission to buy it for you.
By the way, that elk-horn dining room table is a real product I saw in a design center several years ago. No kidding.
- Investing in antiques
Interior designers study art history and furniture periods thoroughly in school. If you plan to decorate your home with antiques, you really should
hire professional help.
Compared to the cost of the furnishings themselves, the cost of hiring an interior designer to make sure that the antiques are genuine and coordinate
well with your other home furnishings is actually quite low. When you are considering purchasing a $20,000.00 antique sofa, it is well worth paying
an extra $100.00 to an interior designer to verify that it is truly an antique and that it is in good condition.
Some of the antiques you purchase may require restoration. An interior designer can put you in touch with upholsterers, furniture refinishers, and
other craftspeople who are trained and experienced in this type of highly specialized and exacting work. An interior designer can also locate antique
fabrics to reupholster antique upholstered furniture.
This is a portion of an interior designer's education that cannot be easily condensed into a do-it-yourself book. This is a situation where the expense
of the project, and the unlikelihood of having a second chance to get it right if mistakes are made, make it preferable to hire a professional.
