Many people use “interior designer” and “interior decorator” interchangeably, but the two professions are very different. Interior design is the science of understanding behaviors to help property owners create a functional room within a building, including the shapes of a room’s walls, floors, and more. An interior designer works closely with architects to design the interior space and has a good amount of experience within the construction field.

Decoration or decorating, on the other hand, is the furnishing of a space with beautiful or fashionable things while working within its functionality. For example, an interior decorator may recommend changing the layout of the furniture.

In other words, decorators do not tend to design, whereas interior designers may design and decorate.

This is a common question. Typically, an interior designer has the skills and professional education to design and draft new space plans — whether remodeling an existing interior space or updating a room in your home.

An interior designer can develop anything from furniture to electrical plans and select all furniture, fixtures and equipment interior finishes. Some typical FF+E include paint, tile, wallcovering, lighting, plumbing fixture for example.

If your project involves removing/moving walls or adding additional square footage to your space, an architect and or engineer will be needed to file drawings with your local building department. These professions are required by the NYC building department to have approved plans on file in order for licensed contractors to pull permits and get a satisfaction of completion.

Hiring an interior designer is an investment. The job of an interior designer that most people overlook when they think they can go at their project alone is the time savings and the return on investment of having a professional execute your project aesthetically and to code.

There are several different ways that we charge – Hourly; Flat Fee; and Cost Plus.

Hourly billing means you are charged an hourly fee for the time it takes to complete your project. This can be tricky at times as many clients do not understand that billing goes further than the hours physically on the job. This includes but not limited to researching, travel, drafting, etc.

Flat Fee billings means that you are billed one flat fee for the design, execution and completion of your job.

Cost Plus means a flat fee based on the percentage of the cost of your construction job. This percentage is determined by the scope of work needed.

Once we visit your space and have a conversation on needs, Ly + Me Designs will provide a fee structure that best suits your project parameters..

We will have a binding contract that specifies the fee structure and frequency of payments.

In order for us to give you the best client experience, we suggest filling out our Client Questionnaire. Our questionnaire allows you to start your gather your thoughts on what like and your budget. The questionnaire also allows us to know if our services and design aesthetic would work best for what you would like to achieve.

After you’ve completed your questionnaire a follow-up phone conversation will help us evaluate your project, and if we may be of help. We will then send an invoice for an initial home/business consultation.

During the in-person consultation, we will walk through your home or business with you, and speak with you about the specific needs of your interior design or renovation project. To prep for us to visit your space the fun stuff begins. We would love for you to gather all the things you love (and absolutely hate!) in either or list or with visual references. However works best for you. One thing that we find very effective is if you can save pictures and send via email or simply start a Pinterest board to share with me.

The biggest item we find that most clients avoid thinking about is their budget. As a professional I am able to guide you on what things can cost but the initial conversation/thought process that we feel needs to be addressed when it comes to budgeting is what you are comfortable spending and what would bring you the best return on invest. Whether that be on resell, emotionally or mentally there is always a return on investment.

After this meeting, once you have determined your project budget, we’ll provide a proposal with our fee/fee structure, and break down how we can make your budget work with your needs. We can determine must need items and allocate funds accordingly.

Note: labor prices are continuously fluctuating. We cannot guarantee the price/budget allocated for tradesmen.

No. I will work with your contractor or tradesmen. I am more than happy to refer you to those who can help as well. No construction related labor is paid to me. All invoices are between you and the contractor. I am able to look over bids and payment requisition to confirm project progression.

No. You are more than welcome to make any purchases on your own. Most of my clients do purchase through me, due to the designer discount I pass along paired with our trade contacts, procurement and installation experience.

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