Spacecrafting
Custom is the new luxury. More and more, homeowners with big budgets are drawn to personalized pieces that no one else has—pieces that are truly one of a kind.
Bhavana Bhimavarapu, interior designer at O’Hara Interiors, sees this all the time in her work. “[Clients] don’t want to go into Restoration Hardware and pick what everybody else has.”
But designing custom furnishings isn’t just about presenting your client with something unique, it’s about knowing how to align their taste and design preferences with their spatial realities. Guiding your client through this process requires deft design know-how. Here are three tips to keep in mind as you create custom furnishings for clients.
Sourcing Matters: Considerations to Keep Top of Mind
The quality of materials you source for a custom furnishing is of the utmost importance. When you’re tailoring a piece to the exact dimensions of a room or picking out specific fabrics that feel cohesive with a larger design strategy, the furnishings still “need to stand the test of time,” Bhimavarapu says. Brands she turns to time and time again include Highland House, Wesley Hall, Younger, Palecek, Made Goods, and Vanguard, to name a few.
Cultivating relationships with sales reps for high-quality product lines can make a big difference in consistently bringing well-made custom pieces to life. Designers at O’Hara Interiors work with The Brands at Rabbit Creek frequently for their custom furnishing projects. CEO Susan Thayer says that designers and their clients can count on the quality of products from The Brands at Rabbit Creek because “real people are making this product,” she says. “Everything is handmade. Products are primarily sourced in the United States and are built by people in our plant in Hickory, North Carolina.”
She notes that because everything is made from scratch, her team can provide truly customized design solutions, and designers can take comfort in the quality of the product and its craftsmanship.
[Related: 5 Ways Design Professionals Can Use AI]
Narrow Options for Your Client
Courtesy O'Hara Interiors
The Brands at Rabbit Creek has a 12,000-square-foot showroom at International Market Square, where designers and clients can walk through and experience the wealth of brands and products within. However, being spoiled for choice can sometimes overwhelm a client. Thayer recommends designers complete a walkthrough in her showroom to narrow down options and recommendations prior to bringing their client in.
“We reach out to our sales rep if we are trying to imagine the unthinkable,” adds Bhimavarapu, who works with Thayer frequently and says reps like her can help you determine if your vision is within reason. They can also help you define your options for customization.
“Narrow the selection down to three options,” Thayer advises, before bringing your client through. Once the client joins you, she recommends “listening carefully for the buying cues like, ‘Oh my gosh this is it, I love it,’ or ‘This fits me perfectly.’”
Think of Function, Not Just Form
The options are endless when designing a truly custom piece—you can select everything down to the nail head. While a client might get caught up in the flair that colors and fabrics can provide, it’s important to consider the functionality of the piece and how it fits into the space it’s destined to live in.
For Bhimavarapu, many of the custom furnishings she has designed recently have been created for the function they provide, Such recent projects have included furniture items that can accommodate family life and entertaining. One client was looking for a sofa where every seat reclined, for example. Another wanted a TV in their living room, but didn’t want it above the fireplace, or covering any part of the windows, so Bhimavarapu designed a custom storage unit to house the TV that could be closed when not in use.
“That’s the power of custom furnishings,” she says. Not only do well-selected custom furnishings create ease in a clients’ life, custom furnishings provide tailor-made solutions for your client’s unique design challenges.
Read this next: Locking in Clients: 4 Tips to Help Designers Secure Repeat Business
|
|
|
