Interior Design Business in New York City or How to get a heart attack during Internship
Do you want to switch your profession and become an Interior Designer?
Do you have a dream of creating beautiful spaces and work with extraordinary people making super creative installations?
Well, think twice if you choose NYC as an area to accomplish your far-reaching goals.
I moved to NYC two years ago. And I was working with my projects back in Moscow as an Interior Designer for about six years or so. I have had my little studio, and I used to hire people to help me with draftings and 3d visualizations when had too many projects. And most of the time our small company was very busy. I felt very successful; I even built the country house for my father. Not large residence, though, but yet with two bedrooms and two bathrooms, with beautiful open kitchen and dining area with fireplace. And so when I was moving here I was ninety percent sure that will find my perfect place to work and keep doing what I got used to doing. And as they say, if you want to make laugh God, tell him about your plans. And I went through three different stages in last two years before I am finally here and now.
So first what I decided to do is go to Parsons school of design and take any course that has connection with the interior design while I was waiting for permission work card. I have noticed so many people there who wanted to switch their professions and eventually they could not put it into life. On one hand, I was there; I have changed my life and my vocation as I was playing piano all my life and then turn into drawing and drafting. On the other hand, most of the times people are not ready for such a thing. This switching period is always hard and sometimes overwhelming and worth many sleepless nights and distorted nerves. But I did it. And what I want to say is people see this profession too idealistically. In realty, there are 90% hard work and 10 or even less % of the creative process that they are craving for.
And here I am, in NYC, in the heart of the most expensive and beautiful houses in the world, having a hard time with expressing myself as my native language is not English, trying to adapt to new life circumstances and find the same passion and ardor to climb these fancy decor stairs. I had had a choice where to work when finally got my permission card. First place was entirely orthodox Jewish construction company, and they were building synagogs most of the time. Which is exciting, I am half jew, and it would be great to do something like this. For the whole community in general. And yet my heart wanted something more fancy and more Soho-style or Manhattan Loft, etc. And I choose to go for an internship in the fancy interior design studio. Initially, everything had looked great, and I was excited. The projects were exactly what I was dreaming of, enormous lofts in Soho with old break walls, external engineering tubes and fantastic urbanistic views from almost all height wall windows.
But after the very first seventy hours work week and three espressos per day and deadline always «yesterday» … Wow, I was hoping for the best. After a month of schedule like that my marriage almost had ruined, I forgot what is it to have the day without doing something on my laptop. I felt like somebody have found the plug on me and was taking all possible energy from me.
It is easy to predict that I could not handle this. Also I was newly married and did not want to lose my happy time with husband. I was totally squeezed up, my nerves were far from normal condition, I have started to have headaches on a daily basis. And it was evident time to go. But the thing is i did not just left the workplace. I left this part of me who was interior designer, who liked more then anything else to create and to draw and to combine and to thrill about all that. I left myself.
And that period actually could last forever till I met a girl. I was working as a model and she was my MUA, makeup artist. And I have found myself again. Because she was my total mirror reflection. She was an architect, and she quit her workplace because she was hospitalized and had to spend almost two months to recover. She started to search new fields for realization her creative talents. And became a makeup artist. As me as well) And these two hours having conversation with her helped me realize that i am not the only one who was abused and overwhelmed with this business wheel. That understanding actually helped me to come back in a rut.
I can surely understand the high competitiveness in NYC interior design, though. And yet I am sure there is another way to be an Interior Designer here, as my intention is not to create just beautiful expensive and sophisticated interiors. Besides, I am not just architect and drafter. I am a yoga teacher(back in Moscow), I am an artist, I am a Reiki healer and highly spiritual person. And if there is just beautiful and shiny wrapper without any filler inside. Well, it is not just disappointing. There is no place for me and no sense in creating a process at all. I don't want any longer be a foreigner in the work system. Instead, I intend to celebrate my differences and use them to my advantage, not turn it against myself with feelings of not belonging.
Meaningful work,
service,
enough spiritual sustenance,
contribution to make a difference,
intuitive and transformational faculties,
wounding,
bringing into life imagination,
high need to beautify and harmonize,
counseling
and healing is intimately bound together in my work destiny.
Paola Navone, one of my favorite woman Italian interior designer, have said, « The world does not need another chair model, what the world needs are new technology and new approach». She had been melding contemporary forms and artisanal techniques in a career that spans four decades. And as an example for me, she put her life into something that closes to her being and has an answer for her inner query.
I would also bring to the point ecological, environmental and humanitarian issues. Our world needs to change. We cannot live like humanity used to live last five hundred years. Creating something (interiors or landscapes or clothes or be a makeup artist) needs to be upgraded with new consciousness and participation in the world that will have an impact as much as on local community as the world.
Creator of healing spaces, using eco-friendly design objects and materials, spaces where energy flow in a right way - that is how I see myself. To create work circumstances where I can use my feng shui knowledge and ability to feel the geometry and space put into practice to harmonize other people's life - that is mine intent. And where I will put the thoughts into all parts of the picture and not just to pursuit the profit.
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