'Interior designed for interior design...'
vis a vis...
'Understanding Your Passion'
Interview with the owner of "El's Design."
Q. What made you decide to pursue a career in interior design?
A. It's my birthright, actually. My father built houses for a living. When my brothers built the house I'm currently living in... I was given a budget for all the main sub-categories... lighting, flooring, cabinets,... all the fittings... and then, I was given 'carte blanche' to put the whole thing together... within that budget."
Q. Was it a large budget?
A. Unrestrained laughter, desperately trying to get under control for listeners... "No, no, paper-backed vinyl and very low grade carpet... your basic steel tub- still available today... all the cabinets came from my other brothers' shop but I still had to choose within the budget.
Q. Family or not, huh?
A. Family or not! I did get one perk... I really wanted a 'beadboard' backing for my kitchen cabinets... the island part that is open to the 'eating area.' I wanted it to coordinate with the door cabinets that I had chosen.
Q. Did you have to pay extra?
A. Not with money... just gratitude and a recognition of the cost of running that machine to make those grooves... and the skill it took to run them. I don't think their machines were CNC at the time, must have been manual because I remember quite a long explanation about setting the depth of the blades just right so as not to exceed the depth of the veneer.
Q. How long ago was this?
A. Oh, a long time ago.
Q. What was the 'gold nugget' from this experience that guided you to explore a bit of formal education 17 years later?'
A. More laughter... "My brothers mocked my choices of materials until the whole house was put together. Then... when they saw all my choices put together in one space... Voila! They loved the look and one of them asked me if he could put the flooring that I had chosen into one of the houses he was building two doors down.
Q. Did you give him permission?
A. No! They laughed at me and they didn't offer me a job so... no.
Q. They say imitation is the greatest form of flattery...
A. Only to a point... you can't give away all your ideas. I did that for 17 years and you know what I found? People would listen to my renovation ideas and portray a solid amount of masked boredom. Then, a few months later, their houses were renovated and I didn't even get invited in for the free advice. Lousy friends! They didn't fix my car for free, in return. No, I paid... and paid... and paid!
Q. Why wouldn't your brothers give you a job if you were that good?
A. Oh, that's easy! In my family you need a
Q. So, what's a motto that could, possibly, describe what has driven you all these years to keep going despite a lack of opportunity?
A. For the most part, "It costs the same to make something ugly or something beautiful!"
Q. Could you expand on that?
A. I'll quote a pastors' wife that purchased a new home a few years ago. 'Oh, decorating makes a huge difference. You should have seen the decorated home compared to the base model... that was not the same home. It cost way more though.'
Q. So, how do you qualify your earlier statement, 'For the most part, it costs the same to make something beautiful or ugly?'
A. Every home has to have good bones... thank God for CBC (Canadian Building Codes), although,
Q. Would you say that your home is that? Magazine styled?
A. I once threw a party for a group of 'older' people... not that old, but they were all 12- 17 years older than I was... Dr. Marilyn was invited and after she sat down in my living room, she said, "I feel like I'm sitting in a magazine." Now, here's the important thing to note... "My husband and I were earning a combined wage that was below the poverty line for a family of four and we are a family of five, well, bigger now that my sons are marrying. So, it wasn't 'income alone' that produced these great results."
Q. So, that's what makes you so passionate about the beauty of interior design?
A. When a person walks into a house that is beautiful, it makes the heart sing back to the person, 'You are worth this beauty and you are a beauty who is worth this!
Squalor and poverty has never given a person a sense of self-worth.
Q. What would you say to people that say, 'That is materialism!'?
A. The designer of the world created 'absolute beauty.' Why would we change that plan?
Q. How can you justify buying beautiful things in a 'bad economy'?
A. What makes the world go round? How do people earn money? Everybody makes or grows something... music, books, flooring, paintings, cars, wheat, cookies,... if you break the chain, we're going to be in bigger trouble than we already are.
Q. Should people be buying?
A. 'Give a little, save a little, spend a little...' That's a J.M. quote.
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