What Makes a Perfect Interior Designer?

In every career path, perfection is the ultimate goal. Interior design is no different, as the ethos of every designer, no matter how different they may be, is to achieve client satisfaction, by creatively adopting aesthetic innovations that suit the purpose of the certain project. There are several features of a perfect interior designer, and it is imperative to evaluate these standards of perfection to determine their validity, and most importantly, to assess perfection as a concept and something to aim for in interior design.?

Perfection is flawlessness and a state of being free from mistakes or defects. For an interior designer, perfection can manifest in many ways, and can also be subject to the project in question. A perfect interior designer could be one capable of; creating harmony in the most disorganized space, identifying and adopting trends as they come and go, embracing any form of design style, and even adopting modern technology into their design projects.??To narrow it down, the accepted notion would be the innovative combination and the ability of a designer to achieve aesthetics and functionality in a space. This means that the interior designer must be able to achieve beauty that resonates with the theme of a space, and at the same time, the space must be fit for purpose. The result of this combination would then be the ability of that space to have a lasting effect on the user. In recent times, interior design has successfully been acknowledged for the psychological effect it has on the occupiers and users of a space, and this is based on how the design of a space affects the mood, creativity and even performance of the occupier. A good interior designer must be able to curate a space that serves its full purpose and amplifies performance and the way the users of the space interact with it. For example, the design by famous Belgian interior designer Axel Vervoordt in the home of American Socialite, Kim Kardashian, made a lot of impressions and quickly become a crowd favourite. She stated in an interview with Architectural Digest Architectural Digest that the quiet but futuristic minimalist monastery theme of her home is her calm after the storm of both her and her Husband’s busy and star-studded lives. That is interior design. Vervoordt’s ability to create a safe haven, using the innovation of a modern monastery, which his client can describe so extensively as being suitable to their entire family, and can even get an entire audience turning heads is a perfect example of the innovative aesthetics and functionality combined.

This notion of perfection has been my roadmap since 2020 when I started practising interior design after completing a one-year certified training. From every colour scheme to every ergonomic measurement, down to every last detail of my floor plans, I constantly made sure to adopt innovation and functionality to reflect the goals of my clients. I made it my mission to achieve the standards of what I like to call ‘contemporary bliss’ which is a current crowd favourite, especially in Nigeria, thanks to the equally remarkable interior designers. I mirrored the design styles I would see in most residential and commercial spaces, but as time went on, I found that these standards confined me. Although they were achievable, they did not capture the essence of my aim as a designer, which is expressing the beauty in incomplete imperfection and abstract presentations. When I finally started my company - Time and Space Interior Designs Time and Space Interior Designs -, I dared to have my inspirations and works reflect the Wabi-Sabi design style, even though I barely just crossed the border of finding my feet. Wabi Sabi is a Japanese design style that expresses ‘the beauty in imperfection’. It uses wonky asymmetry, irregular shapes, dents, chips and cracks, to portray beauty, and because of this, it can easily be considered imperfect. Imperfection in this sense does not connote flimsy or grotesque works, it simply means non-conformity to set standards. Using a piece of contemporary furniture in a baroque-themed space, creating a hygge residential design theme in a restaurant space, and so on, are some examples of what could be considered imperfect design. But should this be considered imperfection? What’s to say such flaws are not interior design in themselves??

The notion that there is such a thing as perfect design, or a perfect interior designer is a fallacy.?Interior design is one of the most creative ways to make innovative changes. The lasting psychological effect it has requires a designer's ability to carry out several trials and experiments, which come with inevitable errors. Therefore, in interior design, trend identification is important, there is room for accuracy, there is room for satisfactory delivery, there is more than enough room for innovation, and there is even room for perfection, but the strive to be a perfect interior designer is a limitation on the sea of creativity which a designer is supposed to explore. When too many rules are in place, it affects the performance of those to which the rules apply. If interior design is, or ever was riddled with set principles of perfection, we probably would not have seen some field-changing remarkable designs which exist today. I watched a Netflix documentary of interviews with remarkable Nigerian Architects, Artisans and Interior designers. I was intrigued by the diverse projects done by these designers, some of them mirrored most of what I am working towards as an interior designer, but I was more in awe of how much innovation and creativity spoke through these projects, qualities which cannot be discovered by limiting oneself to wrongful principles of perfection. Muni Shonibare, whom one could call a ‘veteran interior designer’ and easily one of the best in the profession, described how she always includes African vibrancy, whether it be textiles, structure, graphics and painting, into a majority of her projects. This ethos is a principal aspect of her projects and has played a role in her career success. Interior designers must work with new, different, and even abstract perspectives of design to succeed and more importantly, to keep the field growing.?

Another major reason why interior design is not a field that seeks perfection is that perfection is subjective. What I consider a perfect design, which would most likely in turn make the interior designer perfect, can be regarded as below the bar by another person.?For example, Mario Buatta’s Chintz design style is far from perfect to me, but it could be the embodiment of perfection to another person.?There’s always something about each design that, if changed, will make the design ‘more perfect’. There would always be something an interior designer could have done in a space that would make it ‘more perfect’. But that is not the aim of design. A good interior designer requires creativity, skill, innovation, open-mindedness, problem-solving ability, the ability to detect and achieve functionality, and the ability to create designs that will have lasting effects on the perception of anyone who comes in contact with the space. These standards are road maps and compasses at best. An interior designer who does not adhere to these standards, especially in a way that does not jeopardize the goal of a particular project, ought not to be considered flawed. Interior design gives room for mistakes. The designs we see today, the innovations, are all in one way or another a result of multiple trials and errors. In the words of Scott Adams,?‘Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Design is knowing which one to keep.’?From designers who embrace and incorporate different design styles, those who take inspiration from everywhere and everything, to those who use design to create solutions for everyday problems, and even those who daringly stick to traditional design styles and refuse to follow the trends, there are a plethora of characteristics that breed exceptional interior designers, but there is no such thing as a ‘perfect’ interior designer.?The most eclectic career paths are those which require a person to be creative and maximise their creativity to achieve perfection and client satisfaction. While it’s very important in today’s world to be creative and aim for perfection, such careers are beyond capable of making the professional doubt and lose every iota of passion, confidence and effort, in their work, which, if not for a wrongful standard of precision, could have birthed revolutionary results.?

As much as interior designers must make it their mission to perform to the best of their ability, the strive for perfection in a field which requires limitless experiments, oblique and abstract presentations, and different perspectives is not feasible. Embracing the beauty in imperfection and allowing oneself to explore and experiment, is the bane of interior design, and as such, the imperfection, is quite literally, what makes a perfect Interior designer.

By:

Ufuoma Phoebe Madagwa,

CEO/Design Director, Time and Space Interior Designs.