Week 9: A Bitter Sweet Goodbye

On Monday in the morning I looked for a fabric for one of the designer. After lunch I went on a job with Sherlene. The job addresses one of the bedrooms for the home owners. It consists of the bed shirt, curtains, bed comforter, and a table coverlet. The job had complications and it was good to see how the designer handled each of them. We also had to stop by another client’s house. She had trouble visualizing the furniture piece in her living room. The client wanted to see the chair and a side table in their home. I helped decided on a fabric for the chair. The client decided to keep the side table for the living room.

On Tuesday Rachel and I went out to the warehouse to sort all the items for Marsha job.  Marsha who is the owner has a big job next week in Florida. She is flying a group of people to help with the job consisting of one designer, drapery, and someone to alter the fabrics. We had all the purchase orders for the job and had to locate all of the items. On Wednesday Rachel couldn’t come in until lunch. I called vendors about pricing. I also assisted two designers with task they need done. Natalie needed me to find fabrics that she used for a client. I located all the fabrics for her. The rest of the day I went through discontinue list for different vendors. Thursday was a slow day. After lunch the whole firm through me a goodbye party. It was amazing for me to see how much the designers appreciate my hard work. The rest of day I organized Braxton Culler into categories. On Friday it was my last day. I continued putting up the Braxton Culler. I also went through the discontinues of Braxton Culler. This experience taught me more than just about interior designer.

On the firm website they have their mission statement and the designer philosophy. Yessick’s Design Center’s will provide their clients with three important elements. The first is “to provide a beautiful, creative, and functional design atmosphere.” The second is “to provide superb customer service and quality at a competitive price.” The third is “to provide a unique shopping experience with a presentation that exceeds all others.”

This is Marla who is the Manager of Yessick’s Design Center.  She has been there since the business started with Marsha. Marla knows everything about the business and about all the designer’s projects. She handles all the purchase order and keeping up with the status on them. I feel so bad when most of the calls are for her, because she is very busy.

Week 9: Last week!

So this week was busy busy, because I have been trying to finish up all the materials library.  After finishing up the main shelving unit, I moved on to the millions of fabric samples that needed to be folded and organized in boxes. 

The finished library, so much better!!

 So pretty! Love this Maharam fabric!

On Thursday, we have a rep lunch with Haworth and NOI.  They brought Qdoba and showed us all the new furniture pieces that are going to be on contract.  They also show us the Haworth collection. These are beautiful and unique pieces that are made by all different designers from  all over the world.   Haworth also has a CAD and Revit library on their website that students can use! I have really enjoyed working here at Lauderdale.  I have even been told they want me to help if they stay as busy as they have been. 

The design philosophy of Lauderdale Design Group can be found on their website and is, "The collective experience of the firm’s licensed design professionals insures that every project, regardless of size, is handled creatively and efficiently. The culture of open communication and cooperation in the design studio continues into the relationships with the Design Team and the Client." This can eaisly be seen throughout the design process and client meetings.  Every designer on staff upholds detailed and creative  thought and design for every project we have had thus far. 

The new people I meet were the Haworth and NOI reps.  Amy is more in charge of NOI education and corporate type of furniture.  Amanda is more focused onNOI healthcare, and John is the Haworth rep. 

Week 7

Over the duration of my internship, we have had a series of coffee talks open to the interns and the intern committee. We have even had the opportunity to speak with many thought leaders and design leaders. I think this is one of my favorite parts about HOK. High level people taking time to talk and invest in the lowly interns, truly the mark of caring corporation that is invested in it's people.

This past week, we had the opportunity to sit down with founding partner, Gyo Obata, the "O" in HOK. He told of us about his recent travels in Italy and asked us about our interests. Gyo is world reknowed designer and architect. Some of his more recognizable buildings are Lambert Airport, The Air and Space Museum in DC(1976), the Church of Christ Headquarters, and many others, along with his most well-known, the Priory Chapel, which is just a beautiful example of a modern plan worship space. Gyo is a very bright and charming man, and we all felt honored to chat with him so candidly.

Gyo Obata in front of Lambert Airport

Along with my usual tasks, ordering finishes, assisting with rendering, and space planning, I had the opportunity to work with the structures group. Our structural engineers are awesome. My point person with the group is Sal Gimbert. I have gotten to know Sal over the past 2 months. She is incredibly passionate about non-profit work. So she and I share a common bond here. Last weekend, we helped serve local non-profit together. During this time, she mentioned getting involved with structures, and I hopped on board instantly.Sal is awesome as she talks about our Project Haiti below. Also, she's Australian and is the coolest, brightest person around.

Getting to see building from such a functional and pragmatic point of view has taught me a lot. The engineers truly do make the building and a close relationship with your engineers=a more easily attainable design vision. With the structures team, I was able to help with a deadline they have for an existing building project. I was digging through structural drawings, all done by hand 60 years ago, to determine some existing openings and beam configurations which I then recreated in Revit. 

The staff and client relations are managed by the project manager at HOK. The project manager is always the lead on this. You can always tell a project manager at HOK by whether or not they are on the phone. These individuals have been in the field for a long time and know how to manage very professional AND relational interactions with the client. They are always smiling and upbeat in any client scenario with the attitude of "we can get this done." We are trying to get better about managing projects after construction. However, the projects are often too large to manage well in a way that is cost-effective. I have been told by many designers that you learn during the construction process while you can still fix any issues. After project completion when you walk through, these lessons are a bit more difficult but happen more often. HOK sets standards for work places, so these changes within the workspace are easy and require little effort. However, HOK is always happy to work with an old client. Many of our clients are repeat clients, as well as our large corporate accounts. The workplace studies assesments and any program assesments our done by our strategic planning people. They have very detailed technology and software to do a workspace utilization studies, which are actually helping with right now for our client, BJC. Client type is mostly corporate. However, within the HOK office, we have a labs planning group and healthcare goup. So these are common markets as well. Clients almost always look like a large corporate client with a board or a panel or maybe just one point person for a certain project. The approval time frame is much longer the farther up the chain you have to go for this type of client.

Week 8

This week was busy. The designers know what I capable of and they now ask me to do anything and everything.

On Monday, Amy Monsees asked me to go on a job with her. The job consists of four rooms and two bathrooms. Amy Christe came also on the job. I have never worked with Amy Christe so it was good to see Amy Monsees working with a different designer.

On Tuesday, Rachel had a job with Marsha so I worked at the firm. I went through the wallpaper room and organized the products. I went through the York wallpaper discontinues. I also called vendors about pricing and availability. At the end of the day, Rachel came back for the sales prep meeting. Each month the firm has one sales prep meeting. The designer have busy schedule so it is difficult to get the entire designer staff together. The sales prep meeting has two different vendors that come represent new information to the designers. Tuesday vendor meeting was Kaleen and Craftmaster.

The rest of the week I called vendors about pricing and availability. I looked for fabrics for the designers. I also went through discontinues list of different vendors. I sent back memo to vendors.

The designer presents their ideas with the fabric books laid out so the client can see their options. The clients like to have their hand on the fabrics. The firm has showrooms that display their products. The firm has all of the Microsoft office program but no design computer programs. The designer can use their own design programs if they chose.  The format of presentation they choose is based on the client’s need.

This is Marsha who is the owner of Yessick’s Design Center. She went to school at Alabama. I haven’t told her I am a huge UT fan. She is NCIDQ certified.

Week 9: Time flies.

So this week I actually took off because I have been really sick! :( I actually spent all day last Sunday in the emergency room because the doctors thought I had appendicitis.  I didn’t have it (yay!) and now I am finally feeling better and getting caught up on things before I go back to work tomorrow!

My last week was full of busy and slow moments. I have loved every minute of my internship and I am so happy to be able to stay on with UT Med in the fall!

For most of the week, Heather was either on vacation or traveling to San Francisco for a healthcare design conference. Rebecca had a lot of paperwork to finish for Cancer Institute. We also got the ball running with the Patient Registration project. We had a few walkthroughs and meetings with Lewis Group and other contractors on the project. We worked out any problems that had come up during the construction so far.

I even took before pictures of the Men's restrooms!Checking out all of the Laminam from Crossville Tile!Another renovation we are doing is the bathrooms of the execuitive office buildings. Right after Neocon, Crossville Tile visited us and showed us a new product called Laminam, which is a strong yet extremely thin tile that can be installed over existing tile. It just so happens that the bathrooms have existing tile on the walls we wanted to cover. Heather and Rebecca allowed me to create a wall pattern as well as pick the field and accent tiles for this project. I worked on elevations, color schemes, and spoke with dealerships about lead time for the tiles. It was cool to be given the responsibility for the entire project, and it has really shown how much I have grown as a designer this summer. I was able to design within a budget in a reasonable amount of time while also working out all of the nitty gritty details with vendors and dealers.

LVT in the Cancer Institute.We did walkthroughs of the execuitive bathrooms and of the Cancer Institute this week! It is exciting to see how far along they are with the Cancer Institute. They now have air conditioning in the building and on the 4^th floor they have even started installing LVT! It won’t be long before its up and running!

On Tuesday I had the pleasure of sitting in a meeting with Jeff and Mary Beth about the possibilities for a studio project this semester! I am excited for school to start and see where this project takes us!

For the rest of the week I straightened the materials library, worked on filing, and worked on finish boards.

This week we were asked to discuss the company’s design philosophy. Our philosophy is the same throughout the hospital. This image is seen throughout our website and the hospital and all of the employees are very passionate about it.

This week I would like to introduce Renee. I have been working with her this summer on the Cancer Institute. She is on the left in the picture. This is an image of a presentation about the Cancer Institute.  She is with Dr. Bell and Mr. Ross discussing the plans for the future of the Cancer Institute.