In the past ten years, I have written millions of words, received tens of thousands of inquiries, and drawn nearly a thousand sets of design drawings. Not all my merits have been perfected. I have been appreciated and disdained, encouraged and questioned, and ridiculed many times. Now I still cannot see the end, but I am more and more aware of how there is an end. The only thing I can do is to keep moving forward. No one knows where the end point is. All honors or injuries are just scenery that must be passed through on the road to growth.
Ten years ago, when I first asked for a design fee, I was a civil engineer client from Shanxi. The first design fee was 2,500 yuan. I was very grateful to fate for opening a window and providing opportunities, tolerance and generosity. Looking back at those drawings and design drafts, I really can’t compliment them. To be honest, I may not be qualified to receive this design fee. However, during the implementation process, the customer friendly communicated with me about many inconsistencies between the site and the drawings, details that needed improvement, and we discussed more solutions together. I tried my best with gratitude from beginning to end, and it does feel good to be recognized.
Based on my original understanding, I just couldn’t understand why I had to pay for a haircut, regardless of whether I was satisfied with it; why I had to pay for breakfast, regardless of whether it tasted good or not; why I had to pay for clothes, regardless of whether they fit or not. And how could this drawing, which I have studied art for so many years and spent so much time and effort on, be free?
Design does not have a value measurement standard. I am more afraid of meeting customers with too high expectations. They bring their longings and expectations, as well as their personalities and cognitive needs. We will not judge others prejudgmentally, but we will try our best to greet them in the best possible condition and according to our abilities.
If our conversations can be integrated, or at least we have like-minded interests and mutual appreciation, we will define this cooperation as "human settlement design". But some customers will talk from God's point of view, so we will politely avoid it. If we really need the money and have to cater to them, we will define the cooperation as "commercial design" from the bottom of our hearts.
There are too many people in this world, and they all have their own personalities. We never know whether what we are doing is right or wrong, reasonable or unreasonable for others.
Let me make it clear, I just hope that you can better find a designer that suits you. I always stand my ground here, but at least before cooperation, I have told others that we do not lie or lie.
It is now 3 o'clock in the morning. What prompted me to write this article is business purpose. Making money is an inevitable topic, but how to find a design that suits your taste is very important to you, and it is also very important to us.
Every day, many customers try to understand and make demands. And we will tell them that we are willing to provide you with some valuable early-stage consulting solutions, but this means that we need to spend time. Do you believe us? That's something you should consider.
Some corporate teams will make many compromises in order to survive, but we are living pretty well now, so we do not accept making a plan first to see if we are satisfied before paying. Ants have the way of survival of ants, and cockroaches also have the existence value of cockroaches. If a species violates the laws of nature, it will be eliminated by nature long ago.
Sometimes it’s hard to explain creative things, and we all have to learn to pour the water from our own cups. We have served many customers, but you are new. You have seen a lot of guides and overwhelming information, but that is all free knowledge on the Internet. The information explosion is a scourge in a sense. Some may be alarmist, and some may be comprehensive.
The undulating opinions of three aunts and six grandma cannot represent your own living needs. On the contrary, the more they intervene, the more mediocre they become. Without an ups and downs rhythm, it is destined to be just a piece of background music instead of a beautiful chapter. Everyone has a desire for expression and hopes to become a leader to some extent. They would all use their own decoration experience to warn them with serious expressions such as this and that, but they had only decorated once or twice, while I had decorated hundreds of times. The retired father of the family comes to visit the construction site, and often imposes the same standards as 30 years ago on the execution of construction. When the final result is different, no one will blame his old father, but only blame the indefinable designer.
Including the decoration of my own house, the first thing I did was to clearly tell my father that he could not participate.
20 years ago, we didn’t need interior design because we all cared about food and clothing, not housing and transportation. The living area is only so large, basic living cannot be solved, and the understanding of the world can only be one way. For example, the first thing ancient humans needed was a cave to protect themselves from the wind and rain, and then they wanted to be warm and light a fire. Only after they gained comfort did they learn how comfort can improve physical functions, and only then did they have the first awareness of cave decoration.
China has experienced decades of aesthetic fault. It is difficult for us to evaluate the reasons for reducing people's material needs in the era of planned economy, and uniformly prescribed clothes, shoes, hats, and even water cups and towels. But the pursuit of beauty is just like human beings who always hope to have a better appearance and a healthier body. Without a suitable living environment and sleep, health cannot be achieved. And this kind of living habit is not like food or clothing, which can be adjusted and replaced at will.
Sometimes when we encounter a particularly busy customer, we will consider closing the case. No matter how busy you are, it can't compare to living. Maybe the child's degree house is particularly important and requires many days and hours of communication and various relationship tests. Maybe the work is particularly important and there are too many trips and tasks to handle. Maybe it is better to prepare a better home for a rainy day. It is definitely the most primitive force for warming up relationships, developing better living habits, a platform for children's subconscious growth, and improving the convenience of living for the elderly. That may be life in the next ten or twenty years.
We arranged the schedule, laid out the drawings, got ready, and established a project team, but we still haven’t heard back. Although we were slightly hesitant, we also considered it because of our own livelihood.
Furthermore, we also hope that customers who grit their teeth and come to us will think carefully about it, because the more difficult it is for you to decide on something, the more difficult it is to implement it. We can bear the pressure, but we are not willing to bear the burden. For those who overcome many obstacles to place orders, the failure rate is at least half.
Moreover, every customer has the right to compare, and it is also an obligation. We prefer that you come to us for information at the end, because in this way you will have a better understanding of the average market conditions and the average ability of the market. If you are shameless and want to reveal your heart: "We will be more pleased after you understand others first."
As a residential interior designer, I am sometimes quite conceited. As far as China is concerned, designers like me who have never left residential interior design for more than ten years and who perform high-intensity matching of various needs every day should be as scarce as pandas.
The degree of understanding of life may not be that of a sailor who shouts loudly in the storm, but maybe that of a woodcutter who watches thousands of boats sailing in the river, cooks wine and ponders at night, and speaks gradually softly.
But you can’t say a sailor in a storm is inexperienced, but you can’t say a woodcutter is inexperienced either. Experience can be framed, but experience cannot be hidden.
Reservations for March and May are full and no orders will be accepted. Currently we are only accepting appointments for April.