Inspiration
Interior stylist or interior designer?
You already have ideas of your own about the furnishing of your new home. Turning them into a coherent whole is the hard part, because there is so much to choose from. Which atmosphere really suits you? Which furniture belongs with it? What are the right proportions for the room? And how do you choose the lighting? The step from wishes to a concrete plan is a big one. It matters, too, because your interior should show who you are: it is your house, and you should be able to be yourself in it. So whom do you bring in, an interior stylist or an interior designer? This article answers that question.
Inspiration
The difference in short
Interior architect, interior designer, interior stylist: all three work on the inside of a house, and yet the professions differ. The interior architect comes up later in this article; first the stylist and the designer.
The designers at Studio Reinder Veenstra are trained interior designers. Beyond the styling, we also guide you through building work: as interior designers we stay with you from the first sketch to the finished result, with complete care along the way. We work with a build supervisor and with furniture makers, so bespoke joinery belongs to the offer as well. Once the build is complete, we come by to put the finishing touches to the styling. That full span is why the studio is known as a full-concept design studio.
An interior stylist, in most cases, works on the styling and furnishing alone. For the heavier interventions, a new arrangement of the walls for instance, you would need to bring in someone else as well. With an interior designer the whole of it sits with one party, so you are not hiring an architect or contractor on one side and a stylist on the other.
Inspiration
What a designer takes off your hands
If choosing paralyses you, if you cannot tell what goes with what, or if you simply lack the time to sort it all out, a designer is the answer. The conversation starts with your wishes, and just as importantly with what you never want to see in your own house. Our designers stay involved from beginning to end: arranging the building work, sourcing furniture or having it made, and the actual furnishing. The designs begin with imagination, worked through until the idea is one you recognise yourself in. Experience does the rest: we know how to fit that idea to the way you actually live.
Inspiration
How a designer reads your home
An interior designer starts by reading how you live. Do you work at home and need a study? Do long dinners with friends and family fill your evenings? Together we look at where your time actually goes. The rooms where most of it lands are what we call the heart of the house.
At Studio Reinder Veenstra the architecture, the interior and the styling are tuned to one another. The balance we look for is between light, space and comfort, because that balance is what makes an interior pleasant to live in. And comfort extends to the process itself: the way we work is designed to be easy on you too.
Inspiration
The training behind the title
A designer needs a feel for style and a good spatial eye, but before you commit to a collaboration, check the training too. Reinder completed two vocational programmes: one in interior architecture and one as an interior stylist. The stylist programme covers the practical base of the craft: interior design, styles and their movements, spatial and measurement systems, colour, and the styling of furniture and objects. Drawing up a styling plan and a budget are part of it too.
Reinder also completed the vocational programme in interior architecture. That programme teaches you to lay out a space well and to turn a client's question into a professional design. Walking routes, the division of space, sightlines and the basics of building construction all come up.
Inspiration
Interior architect or interior designer
One question comes up regularly: what separates an interior architect from an interior designer? In the Netherlands the day-to-day work is the same; the schooling is the difference. An interior architect completes a master's degree and is required to keep training. For an interior designer there is no such requirement, though we believe in it: it is why Reinder took two vocational programmes. And Reinder is a trained stylist on top of being a designer, which is something the interior architect's route does not cover.
Inspiration
The first step
If you are weighing up the investment in your home, there is a light way to start: request the free inspiration e-book and see how we think before you commit to anything. In it you will find:
- practical advice for a house that feels like your own
- a good number of interior examples
- pointers you can apply to your new interior
- ideas for a well-balanced layout
- why lighting should never be the last item on the budget
- what working with our studio would bring you
Start your project
Book an introduction
Curious what we could do for your home? We are glad to meet, with no obligation.
STUDIO REINDER VEENSTRA