Sari Munro’s Post

Our Marrickville kitchen is a finalist at the KBDI Designer Awards 2024 in the category Large Kitchens. The jury has already made their decision and the winner will be announced on 17th August. However, the public (i.e. YOU) can vote for your favourite too. Please vote for me! https://www.rfr.bz/lmgo15j PS. If you have sharp eyes you can spot another one of my designs to vote for, in the category Kitchens Plus!

Our Marrickville kitchen is a finalist at the KBDI Designer Awards 2024 in the category Large Kitchens. The jury has already made their decision and the winner will be announced on 17th August. However, the public (i.e. YOU) can vote for your favourite too. Please vote for me! https://www.rfr.bz/lmgboye PS. If you have sharp eyes you can spot another one of my designs to vote for, in the category Kitchens Plus!

Our Marrickville kitchen is a finalist at the KBDI Designer Awards 2024 in the category Large Kitchens. The jury has already made their decision and the winner will be announced on 17th August. However, the public (i.e. YOU) can vote for your favourite too. Please vote for me! https://www.rfr.bz/lmg0q9g PS. If you have sharp eyes you can spot another one of my designs to vote for, in the category Kitchens Plus!

Yay! Fourth time KBDI Designer Awards finalist with these two kitchens! The previous times were 2020: bathroom and laundry, 2022: Design Space (winner!), 2023: small kitchen and small bathroom, but winning a kitchen category would be fantastic! Now have to wait until August to find out what happens. The other NSW finalists were beautiful designs so will be hard this year!

What can I teach about creating interior design to match your style? This is one of my favourite topics, because you can't buy a personal home from a showroom. The first step would be to know yourself and what you like. You could approach this by thinking about what are your values, what is your personal history and what kind of person you are - or what kind of person you want to become. Do a lot of visual research on figuring out what you like and what would suit your house. Then you would choose items that have a meaning to you. Items that make you feel home. "Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." And finally group your decor pieces to create balance and rhythm, make vignettes and be bold! Here's more about the topic: https://www.rfr.bz/llllu86

Speaking of problem solving - here's some photos of a recent wallbed we made. The client wanted to change the baby room to an office / guest room. The room was quite small, but we gained some precious footprint by demolishing current wardrobes. Instead we used that space for a desk - and made a window through the wall to get extra light into the dining room on the other side. We added a custom wallbed on the only full (albeit angled) wall there was. There's just enough space in the room for a queen size bed to open and when not in use it's a pretty little home office. I suggested wallpaper at the back of the wallbed and the client chose the design themselves. I'm glad they did, because it would have taken a few iteration rounds for me to come up with this! I love the colours on it. The only thing I wish we could have done differently is the handle heights - they needed to be fitted high to counterbalance the weight of the bed mechanism and to make it easier to open. Otherwise it's pretty good! If this was my home office I would never get any work done because of the amazing view! I would procrastinate all day, just staring out of the window...

What do we do differently at INSIDESIGN? I have always found this quite difficult to specify as I don't really know what everyone else does! After lots of soul searching and help from a business couch, I've come to conclusion that my 20 years experience in a process-driven company and the project management experience has made my business very process driven. Oh horror, they made me a secret engineer after all! :-D It turns out I like excel and planning. And I like writing processes. At INSIDESIGN we follow a 9 step process and I'm pretty happy with it. It's quite scaleable - some little decoration jobs don't need all steps and it works well with large projects too. Personally I like the added checkpoints where we confirm the deliverables of each step before progressing to the next step. This removes (mostly) the need of redoing concept design changes at the documentation stage, which is expensive and annoying. If you're a process nerd like me, here's the process: https://www.rfr.bz/llieudq

Let's talk about scope creep. This is not project management horror story. It has a happy ending and actually happy everything. Scope creep happens *a lot* in interior design and building industry. Sometimes it's because of the known unknowns, the Pandora's box waiting underneath the bathroom tiles. Sometimes it's just necessary because the improved end result will be totally worth it. Here's some before and after images of the latter kind of case. It started as a couple of infill cabinets and new door / drawer fronts to kitchen but ended up as an amazing open plan kitchen / dining / living room with new joinery and furniture throughout. It does look beautiful, calm and relaxing and has a lot of storage too. Totally worth it, wouldn't you say! Photos here: https://www.rfr.bz/llg7yw6

Creating casual luxury with mix and match? I've noticed that blending high-end and more accessible elements can create a stunning casual luxury vibe. Admittedly the heart of this project was the already amazing room that we got to transform. Looking back at my KBDi Designer Awards win in 2022 with this green lounge room. Here are before and after photos: https://www.rfr.bz/lle9zqs

If you're thinking about kitchen renovation, here's my list of 5 golden rules of what to consider: 1. Careful space planning to make sure all doors and drawers are useable and open properly 2. Appliance selection: choose the ones you really need and will use. 3. If building a kitchen to your own home, consider your lifestyle. How will you use the kitchen every day. 4. Be careful with the trends. They age. 5. With custom joinery you can build a special storage solution to suit any space. Use all of your available space. It's described in more detail here (including a personal disclosure): https://www.rfr.bz/llcaccu