Designing for Commercial and Residential Spaces with Tony Duesbury

In this week’s interview with SBID Awards Product Design judge and Associate at SHH, Tony Duesbury discusses the nuances of designing for commercial and residential spaces. He shares his insights on designing guest experiences and how hybrid ways of working are changing the interior design scene.

How does interior design help to curate greater guest experiences within the hospitality industry?

Every hospitality project is unique and a distinct design narrative allows the opportunity to curate a guest experience. Interior design can help generate interest by creating “a narrative” that helps people engage with the space and learn more about where they arrived creating a ‘sense of place’. This placemaking curates the experience and makes the guest experience more personal.

We have done this in a recent brasserie where the details of the wall panelling took inspiration from the 1970’s façade of the building that was removed, enabling the staff and guests to talk about where the interior inspiration came from. This design curation helps discussion and the engagement between staff and customer to enable a unique personal experience.

When considering the future of the built environment, how do you incorporate sustainable design principles into your projects, from design to procurement?

Our priority when considering the future of the built environment is to look at all aspects of the environmental issues that may affect a particular project and determine what best fits the project. Whether it is creating more greening, checking the carbon footprint of materials procured or considering the MEP to be implemented. As a first step towards achieving that we will look into forming collaborations with consultants and suppliers who have a relevant approach that is beneficial to the process. We will look at individual suppliers and the principles they have in sourcing and manufacturing their materials. Buying local materials and finding unique local craftsmanship within the project vicinity is obviously a huge consideration in order to reduce the transportation carbon footprint.

When it comes to product specification, how does your approach differ between commercial and residential spaces? What are your key considerations?

The selection of materials will be different when it comes to addressing a residential project compared to a commercial project. This is due to two aspects, firstly, cost is a huge factor in. Residential schemes are led more by the heart, whereas commercial projects are led more by the purse. Secondly, it’s about the traffic of a space. Residential schemes can have more luxurious materials that don’t need to take the same wear and tear that commercial projects do. The high footfall in commercial projects, however, means that the durability of the base palette has to have longevity and accents that are easily replaced can have that more luxurious touch.

With new consumer lifestyles and hybrid ways of working, how do you see the design of workspaces evolving in the coming years?

This is something like everyone we have been keeping an eye on as it is an evolving discussion that has yet to settle and likely to be a debate for years to come. Most recently the hybrid way of working has changed by introducing more technological elements that enable a seamless change from working at home and then back in the office. The largest shift is really going to be about creating staff retention by giving those unique offerings within the public office space to engage people to want to be in the office. For instance, in a recent project we have been looking at weaving in the local community and creating more opportunities for social interaction. Additional opportunities for offering amenities within communal space benefits peoples busy life styles and will have an increase in staff retention. As well as a way of attracting new talent.

Finally, what advice can you give to designers entering the SBID Awards?

My advice would be to remain very concise about their design proposal and communicate all aspects of the idea, story and design detail as clear as possible. It is important that the descriptive narrative conveys the same message as the visual design and both are coherent with each other.

Questions answered by Tony Duesbury, Associate, SHH.

The team at Graphenstone encourage designers to re-consider the process by which you specify paint for your projects. It’s more important than ever to consider both the environment and human health when it comes to making responsible design decisions for clients and end-users. So how can your decisions on paint make an impact?

Most paint brands focus your attention on one overriding priority – colour. No one doubts that this is a very important element to deliver on both design and mood. But let’s be honest, these days all the recognised brands have a fantastic range of colours, regardless of the fancy names and the marketing spiel.

180,000 tonnes of plastic micro-beads are reportedly washed into rivers and oceans from the paints industry annually, six times the volume of micro-plastics emitted by the cosmetics industry – where they’re already banned. A day of reckoning awaits the paints industry, and you can help lead the charge.

The microscopic pieces of plastic now pour down globally in ‘plastic rain’, seeping widely into agriculture and our precious food chain, and according to the journal ‘Environmental Intentional’, in late 2020, even into the foetuses of unborn babies.

Indoor Air Quality in areas where high VOC paints are applied can be highly detrimental to the health of inhabitants, as toxic chemicals off-gas into the space, for years after application. 30 tonnes of toxic waste according to the WHO is produced for every ton of paint manufactured. And the chemical blend cannot break down at end of life, turning into plastic dust and spreading far and wide. These are just a very few examples on the long list of egregious risks and damage from a paints industry, which continues largely unchecked.

Check out the report ‘The Hidden Costs of a Plastic Planet’ here from CIEL.

It’s time to change, ‘Beyond Colour’.

So, what is in your paint?

Usually, you won’t see any declaration of ingredients. Neither will you find any trusted alternative to the declared list, such as a recognised ‘harm-free’ product evaluation certification, from the likes of Cradle to Cradle Institute, or Eurofins. These all require a careful and detailed inspection of all the contents, conducted on behalf of the consumer as solid verification of an ecological, or genuinely sustainable claim. So, all the usual paint additives could still be present, from solvents, de-foamers, driers, preservatives, additives, heavy metals and other harmful chemicals.

With ‘estimates of nearly 55% of raw material used by paint companies being crude oil derivatives’, the impact ecologically on our planet and the damage caused is becoming more widely known and repudiated.

“Paints, lacquers, and varnishes are among the chemical everyday products that have a particularly distinct effect on environment and health (chemicals in conventional paints can include glycols, toluene, and xylene).

Acrylic paints typically include a range of biocides to protect the latex, which can include arsenic disulphide, phenol, copper. Just because a paint says it has low VOCs does not mean it does not give off hazardous vapours.” – Architectural Digest Australia/Daniel Wurm, Greenpainters.

Mineral based paint systems are all automatically water based, since they don’t require solvents, using water as the base.

So don’t be misled by the apparent innocence of the “Water Based” paints label. It can disguise a toxic mix of polluting oil and plastic based ingredients, both highly damaging in production and no less toxic at point of use!

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Working together towards success

Tristan de la Haye has worked with industry leaders in design and furniture manufacturing, as a support system to owners and their teams. He found satisfaction when working with entrepreneurs and manufacturers in helping them achieve their revenue and productivity goals at less stressful levels. Here are what he considers some of his achievements with clients:

• Revenue growth of up to four times; and 10-fold net profit growth in three years for a multiple outlet furniture retail enterprise.
• The preparation and successful sale of a family business when the owners decided to retire.
• Helping a small finishes manufacturing business remarkably reduce the overhead cost that increased profits exponentially.
• Helped a retailer with several outlets in operational streamlining to maximize staff performance and time efficiency.

Client testimonials

“Tristan is a pleasure to work with, and I have truly benefited from his knowledge and his commitment to helping me achieve much more in my business life. He is an extremely focused business coach and worked hard to ensure that I achieved the targets we set together. I would have absolutely no hesitation in recommending Tristan to any company that is looking for growth and also wanting to implement new systems that make their business more efficient and successful.” – Eleanor M.

About De la Haye Coaching

Tristan de la Haye’s career has been expansive and diverse. This gives him the advantage as a coach across business aspects – operations, financial control, marketing and sales, customer service, and profit creation. His expertise within the interior design and furniture retail industry is also helping him and his clients harness individual and team potentials.

Tristan started at John Lewis Partnership on their management training program before moving into the SME business sector where he found his niche. From small single outlet companies with modest turnovers to multi-location retail and manufacturing enterprises with revenues of tens of millions.

As an international multi-award-winning Interior Designer and Business Consultant with over 40 years of industry experience, SBID founder & CEO, Dr Vanessa Brady OBE was interviewed for FRAME Recruitment’s recent Interior Design & Architecture Employment and Industry Update for 2021. In this Q&A, Vanessa comments on how the career path for an interior designer has evolved, shares her unique expertise on the key employment trends that she has witnessed throughout her professional career, and offers her predictions for the future of the industry.

How have you seen the hiring landscape and career path of an Interior Designer change over the last few years?

The industry has seen a rise in the number of graduates choosing a career in Interior Design. In the past design was viewed as ‘not necessary’ and had a bad reputation for ‘excessive expenditure’, but in more recent years it has changed a lot. With the professional role of an Interior Designer aligning more heavily to what students learn at university, it has made it much easier for graduates to follow a clear career path. Now, the best recruitment is from university, where students know that they will have a job once they graduate.

As a result of a more career-focused and targeted university curriculum, fewer design students are ‘dropping out’ and the professional practice feed is stronger. When recruiting, practices now have candidates who are aware of the skills that they need – such as strong mathematical skills and soft skills like resilience. These are all skills that are needed to be a designer but something that was not even considered six years ago.

Now designers have to specialise to procure a job in a specific sector, such as hospitality, retail, workplace or residential.

How has the progression of a designer changed and how do you see it changing in the future?

Looking back to three years ago, projects were client-based in terms of the review that a designer received. Additionally, a designer would have to self-promote themselves to get jobs because they didn’t have the methods to gain projects or recruit staff for projects. Growing a practice was not as connected as it is today and that disconnect has held back many talented people that were unknown or in the wrong place.

As an employer, it was very difficult to recruit the right talent and find candidates with the right specialist skills. Fast forward to 2020/2021 when we were forced to go online, designers and architects have been able to create online communities and network in a new way. Now designers can upskill themselves through podcasts, free information and webinars to continue career development online. Going online has also made it great for people that work different hours by proving more flexible working options; it has created a better quality of life for work in the home and office.

However, I do believe that teams need to interact, especially in a creative industry. Sometimes just having a team meeting together at a desk makes it easier to create a concept. Online this is much more difficult, and it can take longer to converse. I think that what we will see in the future is a blended way of working, which will improve the way we communicate in business and provide a better home/life balance.

What is the ‘risk’ vs ‘Qualified’ advice between designers and investors?

The difference now is that as designers, we are always seated at the table of a design project with investors funds. Interior design adds the extra value that helps to sell an investors product. It’s that extra value that makes people stay in the bar/club longer or buy the product. Colours influence the way people feel and act and investors want that for their businesses. It isn’t by chance that places such as restaurants are designed the way they are, they are designed with a return of investment in mind. That is a part of the designers skill-set, and investors want the designers that they choose to have the experience to link the remit with visual aid.

To mitigate risk designers need to ensure that the advice they provide is qualified. It is crucial to consider the usage that the client requires and not to over-specify. This is where it is fundamental to overlap the skills of compliance, legislation, building regulation and sustainability. Untrained designers do not necessarily pull all of these skills together.

In more recent years, the respect between the client and a designer has grown because of these skills and I think that this will only continue to develop. Designers are now required to work collaboratively with builders/contractors and as a result, there is better communication across the industry.

What have been/will be the biggest growth sectors?

When something is global like COVID-19, everyone suffers simultaneously, which reduces risk because you are all in the same place at the same time. However, when we all had to work online, I was initially concerned about the lack of communication between the sectors that would suffer. I remember thinking ‘will design be the first thing to go?’.

Instead what we saw was an uptake in residential design because people were not going out and spending money, so more people had disposable income to spend on improving the home and changing furniture. This growth across the residential sector fed the smaller practitioners, which were my initial biggest concern.

In terms of the business sectors, IT and design were the only two categories of the entire creative sectors that have experienced growth throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

How has the industry experienced ‘change of use’ and will it continue to do so?

Areas such as hospitality, especially smaller boutique hotels which were originally homes, have been forced to close due to COVID-19. However, many of them are now ripe for re-configuring into the super-luxury high-end residential fit-out properties. The larger hotels have taken the opportunity during ‘lockdown’ to refurbish and therefore design and construction in this area have continued.

Is REVIT going to play an important part in Interior Design, just like Architecture?

REVIT and Vectorworks are the two most commonly used, and the most in-demand. So, they will always play an important role in both architecture and design.

What advice would you give someone looking to delve deeper into the visualisation and design fields?

Define the specialism that you want to practice in. In this industry, it is all about getting as much training and as many internships as you can. The more that you can learn about each different sector, the better. I would also say becoming more qualified in a specialism will help when it comes to securing a job, and recruiters will favour this too.

Have social media platforms, such as Instagram influenced the way designers work or design spaces?

I think Instagram has made the industry more popular and reachable, but I wouldn’t say that it has influenced it. It has enabled people to see the design errors that we didn’t see previously and has pushed people to realise that they need to hire qualified designers. Instagram is great for seeing the end result, which people love but we need to show the journey to get to the result.

What do you think is important when it comes to recruitment?

An industry recruitment specialist, like FRAME, has the strong ability to place people into the right roles, the right practices and the right industry. Their experience and expertise give them the ability to advise based on individual and business needs, as a result, the industry will do better.