\nMichaela Reysenn, Founder and Managing Director, KAI Interiors<\/a>
\nUna Barac, Founder and Executive Director, Atellior<\/a>
\nWren Loucks, Founder and Creative Director, Be-Kin<\/a><\/p>\n
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Image credit: Hotel Designs<\/p>\n
Four routes to going it alone<\/p>\n
None of the four arrived at ownership the same way, and are all at different stages of the journey, from a studio approaching its 20th year, to one barely six months old. Michaela Reysenn<\/a> moved to London after her degree but couldn\u2019t get hired. \u201cI couldn\u2019t get a job as an interior designer \u2013 no one would give me a chance,\u201d she said. Working two jobs, she built a \u00a3200 website and took projects on for free, until the restaurant she was working in asked her to design its next venue. It was shortlisted for a design award almost immediately. To which she thought, \u201cI better take this seriously!\u201d<\/p>\n Una Barac followed a more corporate path. A trained architect, she spent seven years at Foster + Partners before moving to Scott Brownrigg, where she spent 14 years running hospitality and residential interiors \u2013 until, as she put it, \u201cI hit the glass ceiling and thought, I don\u2019t want to do this anymore.\u201d She negotiated her exit around the Croatian office<\/a> she had opened years earlier: \u201cI said, I\u2019m going, but I\u2019m taking Croatia, because you can\u2019t run it. You haven\u2019t got the local connections.\u201d Twenty-three people left with her on the day, with no non-competes in place. Though daunting without the big support network, \u201cI had jobs I\u2019d already built, and continued running client relationships.\u201d<\/p>\n Toni Black described herself as \u201ca baby in the game\u201d, with House of Black<\/a> six months old at the time of the panel. She joined Blacksheep around eight years ago to build out its luxury hospitality work and became a partner, but the two ends of Blacksheep\u2019s portfolio never sat comfortably alongside one another. \u201cThere was always a blur when I used to go out and talk about the studio\u2019s work and say something like, \u2018We\u2019re working with Four Seasons,\u2019 for people to say, \u2018but you guys do Five Guys, right?\u2019\u201d Launching the luxury work as a new division wasn\u2019t clear cut enough, so creating House of Black was the answer \u2013 a sister agency to Blacksheep rather than a complete break from it, with Blacksheep continuing as it is and Black\u2019s team moving across with her.<\/p>\n Wren Loucks<\/a> came to the UK from Canada and worked in studios that sponsored her visa, until an Arts Council talent visa removed the constraint. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of like winning the lottery, because it means that you can do whatever you want.\u201d She then founded Be-Kin in 2020, nine months into a part-time MBA, making it through the other side of the pandemic to celebrate six years in business.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t \t\t\t\tImage credit: Hotel Designs <\/p>\n \t\t\t\t Cash flow, fees and knowing your value<\/p>\n In a sector where projects run for years and payment terms slip, the panel agreed that pipeline management is not optional. \u201cYou can\u2019t rely on the one client or job, because sometimes projects pause,\u201d said Black, arguing for deliberately over-extending on leads. \u201cYou need to have a little bit more than you can manage, because you can\u2019t plan for the future.\u201d Barac agreed it\u2019s about forward thinking \u2013 \u201cYou\u2019ve got to be six months ahead. You\u2019ve got to be thinking, what\u2019s my pipeline looking like?\u201d<\/p>\n On fees, Reysenn was candid that the difficulty at the start is internal. \u201cThe hardest thing with fees at the beginning is knowing your value. As a designer you love what you do, so I almost feel bad charging people.\u201d A design fee psychology course she took early on reframed it \u2013 clients push back on a single number partly because design resists valuation. \u201cIf you weigh some gold, it\u2019s that value. With design, it\u2019s different.\u201d Her studio now offers three-tiered options instead. \u201cYou\u2019re giving clients the choice,\u201d she said, and the tier a client picks reveals both their budget and what they actually value.<\/p>\n Loucks agreed the value perception of design can be a battle, but structures her fees differently, tying rates to a defined scope and a fixed period of time. \u201cAs interior designers, we are essentially selling time. So, we\u2019re selling human resource and human design thinking,\u201d she said. \u201cOur businesses are not not-for-profits.\u201d She also never delivers a fee by email alone. \u201cI\u2019ll have a very open conversation. We\u2019ll go through the scope really carefully together so that they understand,\u201d she shared. \u201cAnd that was uncomfortable at the start, especially when you\u2019re presenting six figures.\u201d Barac added that she anchors fees to RIBA work stages and a set programme, so that time spent is visible when a client has yet to sign off a concept.<\/p>\n Community over competition<\/p>\n The panel was unanimous that the design industry is more generous than its reputation suggests, but that the support has to be sought out. \u201cNobody goes, yeah, I can\u2019t wait to go to a room full of strangers and just nurse my glass of wine or a coffee awkwardly!\u201d said Barac. \u201cBut if you want to run your own business, you don\u2019t have a huge amount of choice \u2013 because if you put all your eggs in one basket and just follow one corporate client, if they slow down with their workload, what are you going to do?\u201d<\/p>\n Reysenn made the case for suppliers as an under-used part of that network, connecting studios to one another and to extra capacity. \u201cYou\u2019re only as good as your team, you\u2019re only as good as your suppliers as well,\u201d she said. \u201cIf they\u2019re going to not deliver on time or send you the wrong thing, it\u2019s going to reflect badly on you.\u201d<\/p>\n A more fluid workforce<\/p>\n For Reysenn, one of the biggest shifts of recent years is in how teams are built. She has deliberately kept KAI small and nimble, which made it easier to adapt through Brexit and the pandemic, and fills the gaps with fractional hires \u2013 including an operations director one day a week. \u201cI can\u2019t have somebody full time on that role, because we\u2019re not big enough. But actually having that person one day a week is so valuable.\u201d She also sees the change in the CVs arriving: two years now reads as a long stint, and candidates increasingly run something else alongside design.<\/p>\n Barac framed the same shift as a retention question. \u201cAm I better off without this person in entirety, or should I just take them for three days a week? And also, it\u2019s less of an overhead for you.\u201d Both pointed to mothers returning to work as the clearest example. \u201cThey\u2019ve probably been in a really high-level role where they\u2019re so well educated and have got such a massive skill set, but now they can\u2019t commit to that full-time role anymore,\u201d said Reysenn. The panel all agreed fractional work is a gap that can work well for both employee and employer.<\/p>\n Growing without imploding<\/p>\n An audience question on growth was responded to with the most consistent advice of the session: to go slower than you think. \u201cIt\u2019s winning more work, isn\u2019t it?\u201d said Barac on what prompted Atellior\u2019s growth. \u201cBut I always try not to grow too fast, because if you lose the hold over quality, that\u2019s when you very quickly also lose the trust of the clients. I\u2019ve seen businesses expand really quickly and then implode.\u201d Diversifying by sector and geography, she added, had kept Atellior steady when UK hospitality slowed.<\/p>\n Reysenn described KAI\u2019s growth as gradual by default rather than design, driven by LinkedIn connections and word of mouth. \u201cWe\u2019ve never really invested in marketing at all. It\u2019s something we\u2019re starting to do now,\u201d she said. Black focused on the cost base. \u201cIt\u2019s just making sure that your overheads still stay at a point that you can control if anything drops. And your growth is your pipeline, right?\u201d Flexibility, she argued, is what allows a studio to scale back to its core team without breaking.<\/p>\n The pearls of wisdom<\/p>\n Asked for one thing they wished they had known, Black returned to asking for help. \u201cWe have many skills, but we don\u2019t have everything,\u201d she said. \u201cYour circle can\u2019t be yourself. You\u2019re not a magician, you\u2019re human, and it\u2019s okay to fail. It\u2019s okay for a client to be terrible, for payments not to come in. You just have to keep going \u2013 and don\u2019t be embarrassed to reach out to others.\u201d<\/p>\n Reysenn focused on the flexibility myth. \u201cPeople always talk about when they\u2019ve got their own business, maybe they\u2019ll have more flexibility. And in many ways you do,\u201d she said. \u201cBut people underestimate the fact that you never turn off. Your work\u2019s never done, at least for me.\u201d Barac\u2019s advice was short but sweet \u2013 \u201cTrust the process, trust yourself, and trust your team and your clients.\u201d<\/p>\n Loucks linked the business back to the founder. \u201cThe more I work on myself, the bigger my business grows as well. There\u2019s a real connection between my own personal development and evolution and the business.\u201d<\/p>\n The Interior Design & Architecture Summit (IDAS) is an annual event hosted by Forum Events & Media, bringing senior designers, architects and key industry suppliers together for a day of pre-arranged meetings, networking and seminars. If you are interested in exhibiting at the 2027 event or if you are a senior designer and\/or architect and would like to attend the event, please contact 01992 374100 or email\u00a0interiordesignsummit@forumevents.co.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n Main image credit: Hotel Designs<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIn the design world, we often talk about creativity, but a very crucial part of successful studios is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":587420,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[265797,265798,265799,146,265800,85,5453,46,265801,265802],"class_list":["post-587419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-atellior","tag-be-kin","tag-building-a-design-studio","tag-entertainment","tag-house-of-black","tag-il","tag-interior-design","tag-israel","tag-kai-interiors","tag-running-a-design-studio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=587419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587419\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/587420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Jess](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1-4.png\")
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