Below is a question from a FB friend….

Dear Vicente,

My fiancé and I recently bought our first home and I couldn’t wait to get in and start decorating. I am not formally trained and I don’t have a ton of experience, but I’m an artist who studied fine art in France and I’ve always been told I am a natural when it comes to interiors. I thought I would finally be able to show my true vision to the world using our new home.

For the last six months I have obsessed over every detail, lived and breathed design, arranged and rearranged floor plans, and scoured every possible resource. After all that work, I don’t feel like my vision is coming together at all. In fact, I think that I have put so much pressure on myself to make my home perfect that I have lost my vision entirely. I’ve also been hindered by my fiancé’s contrasting ideas for our space as well as price and time constraints.

I follow your blog and your vision is so clear and apparent in all that you do. Your spaces always possess that “thing without a name” or that certain something that can’t be articulated, but it makes a space great and whole. As an experienced designer, do you have any suggestions for finding my vision and keeping it at the front of my mind?

With admiration,
Visionless

Dear Visionless,

Great space is not about being perfect, it is not about every item being a ten and it’s not just about the objects in the room. It is about the concept or vision of the overall space.

To me obsessing translates to insecurity and being unsure of what you want.  I always tell people to go with their gut, trust yourself and try not to second guess every decision you need to make.

I would first start by doing a floor plan and furniture plan to scale on paper, go into your mind and pull out what is important to you and your fiancé and what are your needs.  Then you can start balancing it out in the plan.  You should be aware of scale, the ying and yang and try to have a sense of humor.

 If this doesn’t bring you joy or a sense of well being, maybe you should hire a professional that can translate your wishes into reality.

Who out there has had similar problems?

Is it harder to do it for yourself than for other people?

What is the biggest blow to a designer or any other creative person?

It is the termination of a project prior to completion, whether it be financial or difference of opinion it doesn’t matter.  I have explained this to one of my facebook friends who has recently suffered this blow.  I have told her that it has happened to me and almost every designer out there.  Her friends recommended contacting the client and saying to them, “What can I do to make you happy, what can I do to make this right for you? “

These are hard words to say when you feel you have done your upmost on behalf of the client, where your personality and talent in no way have been the cause of the problem. We are living in times where an enormous sense of entitlement and turmoil is prevailing in our society.

I think we should all be responsible for our actions and ourselves and try to learn from whatever lesson is in front of us and refocus towards the positive. 

How have you coped with things of this nature?  Speaking from 37 years of experience I still felt like a piece of crap when things like this happen.

Name: natalie
City: new york
State: ny
Country: usa

Comment:

First of all I have to say that as a new interior designer, I always admire your work and creativity.
I have 2 questions for you.
The first one is how do you take creative risks, like pairing completely different furniture and styles? Any advice?
Second, what are your first client meetings like? What do you show or bring with you to discuss with your potential clients?
Thank you and keep up the amazing work!

Vicente Responds:

I don’t see it as a creative risk; I see it as I dialogue. They may be different in style but somehow I try to find a common thread between them. I go for the ying and yang, square with round, smooth with rough, but there should always be something that gives the different styles compatibility.

My first client meeting is always in my office as I feel it is important for them to be in my surroundings to be able to see my work. This also gives me the opportunity to bring out my three books, my publicity books and my past job folders. Another advantage of being in my office is that if I need to illustrate a thought right away everything I need is at my fingertips.

I discuss with them how I work and I try to find out what it is that they want and more importantly what they don’t want. I find that giving too many ideas without knowing their likes and dislikes can be a double edged sword……you may suggest something that might turn them off too early on in the process.