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Interior design is a multidimensional profession, in which creative and technical skills are applied to achieve a desired interior environment. This designing enhances the quality of life and culture of the occupants and is aesthetically attractive. The designs are created with respect to the regulatory requirements and encourage the principles of environmental sustainability.

Designing an interior environment is not a simple process. It follows a systematic and coordinated methodology. The goal is achieved by research, analysis, and integration of knowledge into a creative process. This methodology is mediated with the help of the vision and demands of the client about the interior of the place.

The interior design is influenced by many disciplines including architecture, product design, and most of all, the environmental physiology. The trend of interior design keeps on changing with time. These depend on some external and internal factors. Among the external factors, media has posed great influence on the changing trend in this field.

There are mainly two types of media; print media and visual media. Interior magazines present vast options regarding the interior of the building. There are a large number of fashion magazines as well. These have a separate interior design corner. World renowned designers publish their advertisement in the magazines. It is an effective tool for the publicity of the designer. It has made the work so easy that people look at the advertisement of their choice and guess the capabilities of the designer. Thus, they easily approach the decorator of their own choice.

The designs influence the demands of people. If they opt to refurnish their house or office, they consult the advertisements in the magazines. The alluring designs enable them to think of a beautiful living place. On the basis of the sketch, they visualize the whole interior of the house. In this way, they become more specific and clear about their demands.

In addition to the print media, the visual media has no match. It influences the taste and the demands of people. Media presents many “Do it yourself” programs that enable you to have each and everything of your taste and desire. It also enables you to understand the technical points, involved in the selection. A home requires a different interior than an office. It is as if someone is guiding you to set the interior of your place.

Moreover, people are very influenced by the glamour shown on the televisions. Things that people see in the television, they want to have them in their vicinity. The interior, similar to a famous television program, becomes a status symbol for the people. It is something that they idealise.

Moreover, people always idealise the belongings of their dear super stars. Their living places, shown in the television, greatly influence them. Like everything else, the interior of a celebrity home becomes the fashion of the time. They demand their decorators to create a living place similar to that of their ideals. Visual media is somewhat prior to the print media. Visualizing any interior design reveals their demand to them. Thus, almost every new thing is introduced by or through the media.

Whatever your interest in interior design, London is likely to have what you are looking for. Maybe you are seeking inspiration and imaginative tips on interior design for your own home or you are an interior designer and want to promote your own work, or perhaps you want to hire the services of a professional designer or even study interior design yourself, no matter what your need is, there is no better place to satisfy it than from the design capital of the UK itself, London.

Visiting Exhibitions in London

London hosts a number of exciting exhibitions every year, some of which focus on a specific area of interior design and others that are broader in their approach. Exhibitions serve many purposes, they can showcase new talent and fresh ideas from up and coming interior designers often alongside the work of already well established and highly sought after designers in the industry, they highlight the latest fashions and trends, spark new creative ways of thinking, provide opportunities to network and increase business sales and of course they offer the chance to view the work of some of the best interior designers in the world.

The following list represents just three Interior Design Exhibitions that regularly take place in London:

o 100 Percent Design – Exhibition usually takes place in September over 3 days and is open to the general public on one of those days. More information can be found at http://www.100percentdesign.co.uk

o Decorex – This exhibition also takes place each September but is only for trade and professionals in the interior design industry. Details of the next exhibition can be found at http://www.decorex.co.uk

o New Designers Exhibition – opens to the public and exhibits the work of thousands of new and up and coming designers every July. You can find out more information from http://www.newdesigners.co.uk

There are of course many other exhibitions taking place throughout the year and a list of them can be viewed on The British Interior Design Association website at http://www.bida.org

Hiring a professional Interior Designer

Many of us would like to transform our own home and although we may start out with great ideas and intentions, quite a few of us never actually get around to doing anything about it. Hiring a professional interior designer is one way of getting it done and if you don’t have someone in mind already; one place to start looking is The British Interior Design Association. The BDA keep a list on their site of interior designers who are either registered members or associated members.

Registered members are the most qualified and have the most experience as in order to get registered they have to satisfy the Association’s strict criteria. An Associate member has to have been working in the industry for at least a year and will have passed the association’s interview process for membership. You can search for an interior designer at http://www.bida.org.

Another option is The Interior Design Handbook website at http://www.interiordesign.com, where you can search a list of potential designers by location as well as speciality. You will also be able to view their profiles online.

Studying Interior design in London

London offers hundreds of courses on various aspects of interior design starting from the most basic right through to graduate degrees and beyond and so finding the right one can seem like a daunting task but it needn’t be if you know where to look.

A small sample of interior design schools in London include:

o The KLC school of Design

o The AIU School of Interior Design

o The Interior Design School

You could also try searching for other courses at http://www.floodlight.co.uk, which is the official guide to all the different adult education courses on offer throughout London. UCAS will also be able to provide you with comprehensive information on different undergraduate courses that are interior design related and what colleges and universities are offering these courses.

Why London for Interior Design?

London attracts a wealth of talent and creative thinking within the interior design Industry and is an important springboard for launching the very latest designs from some of the best interior designers in the world. London also provides endless opportunities for up and coming interior designers to showcase and promote their own work and can be a source of inspiration for anyone interested in interior design at any level.

How often do you enter a room and find certain details or areas that you feel good about? Are there areas in your own home that you find nice or appealing? In interior design, these are good features of a room. There is a decorating philosophy that goes, “Accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative”. By following this basic interior design philosophy you can highlight the positive or good features of the room and come up with a pleasing design scheme. Let’s say you have a beautiful fire place in your living room. This is a good feature and often a fireplace is used as a focal point in interior design. The first thing you want to do is accentuate this good feature by making it the focus of attention and building a conversation area around it.

It is rather easy to notice the positive details of any given room, making the task of accentuating the positive features easier, but how do you deal with the problem areas? The interior design philosophy teaches us to eliminate the negative and when it is impossible to eliminate it, just camouflage it. Do you have any area in your home that you wish doesn’t exist or is it in a particular architectural style that doesn’t go with your own personal taste or does it have pillars or columns that are distracting?

Here are some possibilities of problem areas that you might have in your home and how to deal with these.

How would you deal with a wall containing a distracting column?

1. You can make it disappear by installing cabinets that will fill the spaces on either side of it. This will make the column appear as if it were part of the straight wall because it is already in line with the cabinet’s face.

2. If your area is big enough and you can afford to lose some space, just simply build a new wall that runs across the face of the column.

3. The simplest and least expensive way is to paint the wall and column with one color, making the column blend into the wall and thus make it appear less obvious.

Have you come across a room with a pillar planted right in the middle? I bet you wanted to hack that pillar right off the floor. The problem with a pillar placed right in the middle of a room is that it cannot just be removed as much as we want to. This usually is essential in the structure’s integrity and eliminating this is definitely not an option. How then will you deal with this kind of a problem? Although this is not a positive feature of a room, you might want to accentuate it and make it stand out. Instead of looking at it in a negative perspective, try to make it a positive feature by making it the focal point.

1. You can paint the pillar a brilliant color, especially if you are planning to have a high-tech or avant-garde room.

2. You can also use some eye-catching device or paint it in stripes to catch attention.

3. If you are planning to have a traditional room, try installing an intricately designed capital and make the pillar stand out.

4. If you have a large room, a mid-room pillar may actually give you the opportunity to divide one big room into two. The pillar could be used as a starting point of a wall that will convert one huge room into two different areas.

5. The easiest and least expensive way to camouflage a pillar is to paint it with the same color as the walls. Although this is not a very effective way to eliminate the irritating center pillar it can at least make it less obvious.

6. The best way to make a mid-room pillar disappear is to mirror it. This is very effective since the mirror will just merely reflect the rest of the room.

Having vivid mental pictures and good imaginations of how things should look like will enable you to solve your interior design dilemmas. And with some help from the interior designer’s well followed philosophy, you can create the same harmonious room that often only designers can achieve.

Interior Decorating Styles – Part One – Medieval to Pre-16th Century

It is so important to know what decorating style you prefer before you commence a decorating project. Knowing your preferred decorating style will help you to answer many questions and guide you through the myriad of decisions to come.

In part one we will look at the decorative styles contributed by the Medieval to pre 16th century. This five part series on decorating styles will give you a snap shot or a quick peek into the essence of decorating styles. It is written as simplistically as possible; not as an insult, but, so that anyone can benefit from the information – the professional and the novice.

In the Medieval to pre 16th century the domestic preoccupation with decorating was limited to stone-built or timber framed castles and manor houses.

The interiors of medieval homes were sparsely furnished which allowed the architectural shell to be the focal point, so to speak. This is similar to what we call the Minimalist style today. The furniture was made mostly of oak, elm or chestnut. The tables were wooden boards that were supported on trestles and the seating was mostly benches and stools. This should bring to mind the Mission style and Craftsman style of decorating. The beds were canopied and usually had 4 posters. The decorative adornments that were placed on furniture, woodwork, and textiles were based on three vocabularies of ornament: Romanesque, Gothic, and Heraldic.

The Romanesque influence included chevrons, foliage and even beasts on furniture. The easiest way for me to describe a chevron wall is to say that it is similar to a classic herringbone design. You know, the zig-zag look or sometimes stripes. That technique came from the medieval to pre-16th century. Gothic ornament included architectural elements such as lancets, foils and tracery. Tracery is a pattern of interlacing lines in a lacy pattern that often outlines stain glass. It’s typically made of wood, stone or iron and is usually one long continual line (or mullion) that is shaped to form patterns. It is very geometrical. If you Google St. Paul’s Cathedral, you will see exactly what I mean. You would typically see tracery on old historic structures. Sometimes tracery is used in furniture, lamps, and chandeliers, too. The last contribution we will look at from the Medieval to pre-16th century period is Heraldic decoration. Heraldic offered the world of design motifs and emblems. Similar to family crests or monograms.

Part two of interior decorating styles will explore the 16th and 17th centuries and how interior decorating was enhanced by the contributions from those times.

Just when you think that these types of ports of entry are only ideal for your front, back, or patio doors, you suddenly discover that they also fit together with your interior design. What’s more, they carry a number of advantages that you will surely enjoy.

Let Us Talk about Design

Perhaps one of the most obvious benefits of using interior French doors is uplift in the aesthetic value of your home. There is no wonder that these doors have always been commended and praised because of their wondrous beauty. You can capture the real essence of the interior French doors like this:

Just imagine yourself being in front of a huge door, with smooth, bright-colored wooden frame. All around the frame, you can see etches of blooming flowers or perhaps branches bearing fruits or birds that sit on the treetops. Nature is at its best right at the frame. Then you take a peek inside your room through the glass panel. In the morning, the bright lights of the sun will be the one to wake you up and remind you of what a gorgeous day is waiting ahead of you.

Seriously, no one can really capture into words the essence of interior French doors, but your eyes and the rest of your senses will know about it.

Enhance the Value

With the increase of its aesthetics is also the boost of the economic value of your house. A lot of people do not understand this benefit, yet it is important that you do.

It has something to do with real estate. Unless you have some dream of passing your house to your children in the future, there is a good chance that you are going to sell it to someone. Of course, your buyer would want to get good value for money.

Your interior French doors can help you with that one. As mentioned, interior French doors are beautiful, making them worth every penny. Moreover, if you can make use of the best materials available, from the wood to the glass, you can further ask for a higher price. After all, the French doors can last for such a long time.

Add Up More Room

Do you feel like you do not have enough space for your house? Do you want to know how you can add more without really spending too much? You could be one of those who are apprehensive about using French doors. As mentioned, they can be gigantic. However, what you do not know is that they can help you when it comes to adding more room.

First, since they are doors, they do not really occupy too much space. Also, since you can combine the frame, which can be made of wood or of steel, with glass, you can invite more light into your room. With enough light and perhaps lighter shades for your walls and floors, there is no way that you cannot expand your room, at least to your eyes.

Minimize Energy Cost

Even if you have a small home, there is a good chance that you are still spending a huge amount of money for energy. These include the use of heaters, air-conditioning units, and light.

With the installation of interior French doors, you can bring down the total energy cost. Natural light will be enough to provide you with the ambiance and lighting you need to last for several hours in a day. Rather than switching the lights on earlier, you can wait for night time to finally be revealed through the glass. The glass, moreover, can provide the right insulation to protect you from the raging winds or cold that would normally happen during winter. You will also have enough sunshine that penetrates through your glass during summer and spring.

Take Your Pick

There are different kinds of interior French doors that you can choose from. First, you have the folding doors. These basically occupy the entire wall of a room, but if you are going to open the door up, you can also remove the hindered walls and reveal a great view. You can also widen the space of a small room.

This is also a good way on how you can divide smaller rooms. For instance, if you want to set up an office, instead of building another room, you can perhaps allocate a small one in your master bedroom and add an interior French door to make the home office look professional.