Kimberly Rider Interiors

Love working with you too!! What an incredible journey and how beautifully the home reflects your colorful and energetic style! Can wait to get the outside to match the inside!! xoxox

Thank you Jill! Love working with you & bringing together a home that you adore coming back to every day xoxo

Thanks Chris! Great job and I agree, let's make some new furniture together!

I love working with you both and look forward to helping whenever I can!

I just love working with you and your family, Lynn. It is going to be a fantastic day to behold your new home and get you moved in! What a great project this has been.

Warmly,

Kimberly

Thank you Devon! Your family and the work we do together is always so creative and collaborative. I'm super excited about our next project: making a place for family memories and activities in the years to come! -Kimberly

Thank you Ellen for your years of support as a client, collaborator and friend! I love working with you and sharing our common interests in sustainability, good living and the joy of making your space your own!
xoxo
Kimberly

I would like to respond to this review as I think it highlights the problems that can occur if a client decides to hire a designer when they are very late in the design process or if their expectations around budget or timing are not feasible.

The designer and client relationship is a collaborative and dynamic one, requiring mutual respect and trust built upon by time spent together. Clear goals, a realistic budget and timeline and a process that everyone participates in lay the path for a successful job.

On this project, my firm was asked to come in and look at several areas of the home:
1.Kitchen Updates and updated lighting and décor for breakfast room
2.Small Sitting Room fireplace and furniture layout
3.Closet, Window and Room layout for the mother-in-law suite
4.3 bathrooms including a master bath
5.Master Bedroom
6.Formal Living Room and adjacent office.

To begin work, we requested a retainer and billed hourly for our Conceptual Design work and meetings. As we were already working on another project that was slated to be ending in about two weeks, we let the client know we could not start right away.

We met several times to review each of the areas and obtain the existing drawings for each area. Photographs and measurements were obtained. Every member of the family had different ideas about what style was desired and each of those opinions were taken into account in the design process. In the bathrooms, the construction was already fully in framing and rough plumbing and electrical installation. Issues had come up that I was asked to respond to onsite and in a brainstorming session we discussed some solutions. One idea helped solve the problem, but did require some reframing. The decision to pursue a costly change this late in the game was not pursued…understandably.

My design process involves in-depth meetings and image collection and sharing so that we can produce Mood Boards, Floor plans, Renderings (with materials rendered to scale) and detailed specifications. These detailed renderings and material recommendations were provided for the Formal Living Room and Office, Floor Plans were provided for the mother-in-law suite, Master Suite and Living Room. Design recommendations and style direction in the form of images were provided for the kitchen updates, the sitting room fireplace, ideas for updating the breakfast room and Living Room lighting and redesigning the office and master bedroom.

It became clear that tile selections were needed immediately for two of the bathrooms. Images of other bathrooms showing style direction were shared and in seeing that the client liked what she saw, meetings were set to shop for tile in person. After a one hour meeting at the tile store, the small guest bath shower tile was selected, recommendations for a way to update but use the existing vanity were presented and an idea for the main guest bath tile was discovered. This main guest bath tile needed a detailed layout, custom glass tile color selection and rendering. Color Strike off Samples were requested for this tile. This detailed, color, to-scale rendering was provided for the client and tile store and was the tile that they eventually purchased and installed (even though a less expensive alternative was entertained and discussed). I was never told during the process that the tile selections were worrisome for any family member, merely just enthusiasm over how beautiful the tile was and a wish that it wasn’t the more expensive option.

Inevitably, the focus of this review is on how rushed and stressful the process felt for the client. I think it could have been avoided had I been brought in months prior to the project starting. I understand a similar experience happened for this client in her last project where the value that a designer can bring was not fully realized.

I strive to listen to my clients’ feedback, taking into account responsibility when something does not go well for either part of the relationship. I know how important it is to be sure my firm is given enough time and budget to do our job well. Over the last 18 years of working in this industry I have learned a lot and know that our current design process and repeat clients tell me we are doing work and creating an environment that can be collaborative, fun and satisfying.

And yes, I have written two books, designed for celebrity clients, curated high-end eco-fundraising events and had an absolute blast doing it, it’s not at all about my ego. I just truly love what I do and am blessed to be able to share this amazing joy and passion with my clients, family and friends!

Respectfully,

Kimberly Rider