Chandelierious!

We are in love with this chandelier that we've installed in a client's dining room in Eldorado Country Club, Indian Wells... It us made of hand-blown glass "bubbles" suspended on shiny steel cables that pick up the high-intensity lighting from above- now, to get some artwork on those walls! Our Interior Design firm loves turning a client's home into their Dream Home!

What Have You Been Putting Off at Home?

Have an unfinished home remodel project? Something that you "let slide" last year? You'll be suprised at how much custom design you can afford: our newest interior design clients in Rancho Mirage are getting a new guest bathroom- for under $7500.00! This includes custom vanity cabinet, color and tile selection, and white-glove project management with the security of a professional design team behind their remodel project. We love remodel projects- seeing a homeowner in love with their house again is a great feeling!

Turning to the Pros: Real Estate Agents and Brokers Benefit Using Interior Designers

Studies show that sales in challenging economic times require more effort and expense in the area of advertising and promotion.

Miller Young Interior designers can have an integral role in increasing your sales and enhancing your sales from several points of view. Whether it is a custom home or a multi family tract, there is a solid foundation for interior design involvement. These professionals have a specialized knowledge of how to use materials, space, color and texture as well as furnishings and accessories that are specific to your target market.

This knowledge and skill can be a time saving and money saving benefit to hiring a design professional either for a consultant on a property you represent or on a referral basis for your clients.

A designer can help guide your client through decisions, resources and the entire process to give you a finished product that is beautiful, livable and extremely marketable within your budget.

Potential homeowners at all levels are becoming far more discriminating in general. The common thread these discriminating customers share is insisting on features and finishes of the highest quality.

Increasing sales in tough economic times:

• It’s all about increasing sales as well as moving product. Interior designers want to be a part of this as much as you do! Selecting finishes and materials that hit the tastes of your region and marketplace can make the difference between a sale and a product that sits on the market. Model homes for example have long been used by builders and developers to assist potential buyers to visualize the lifestyle that they are presenting.

• Interior designers can save you time and money

Whether you use Interior designers prior to listing as a consultant or to assist with staging or have them available to assist your potential buyers on an individual basis, they can help you sell a home before anything is renovated or installed.

· Interior designers can help guide your buyer or seller through a process that is efficient and appropriate to the project.

· Eliminates second guessing of what your buyers or seller wants.

· Building confidence in the right choices to close a sale; is a primary benefit of using a qualified interior designer.

· Increased perceived value in the marketplace

Alliances with designers provide agents with a significant edge in providing excellent personalized service tailored to your clients. This alliance increases your value in the mind of your client. If you have designer resources available that other agents in your community are lacking you will have the edge on your competition.

• Creating Client Confidence and Closing a Sale:

A skilled interior designer can actually help you close a sale. Having an interior designer present to “seal the deal” via a walk through or even a “complimentary consultation” to show the possibilities of the residence can create that additional confidence that the client may need from an outside ”professional” other than the agent or broker. A designer is a useful sales tool in helping the perception of your frame of reference, quality of detail and the perception of a property and assist in closing the sale.

So whether you are considering how to merchandise the “lifestyle” concept of your listing or marketing your homes, or just a consultation on how best to prepare a home for sale, rely on the interior designer to help increase their sales through their specialized knowledge of market trends, finishes, appliances, and aesthetics to close your next sale.

Summer Brights and Whites

Liven up your summer by adding accessories in porcelain white and bright colors.
These accents can bring the lively, cheerful colors of summer into your favorite room. There are a variety of well-priced accent pieces that can add seasonal zip for summer. We decorate for the holiday season, why not for the summer season? Try a bright white bowl filled with colorful fruit like bright yellow lemons or green granny smiths.

Vases, photo frames, servicing trays are all great ways to bring bright accents into your space. Keep accent items small and in groupings or use one or two large bright pieces to add focal accents. White is a great “non-color” to work with as other colors can be added to it to suit the season and décor of your room.

All accent accessories shown here are from Two’s Company “Palm Springs” Collection available through William Miller Design in Palm Desert- providing interior design services for the communities of Palm Springs, Rancho Mirage, Cathedral City, Palm Desert, Indian Wells, and La Quinta.

Adding Dimension with Panelmax

Looking for a way to add some depth and dimension to your walls? Why not begin a love affair with one of our favorite locally-made interior design products, Panelmax. William Miller Design has been using this product in residential interior design projects in Rancho Mirage, Palm Desert, and Indian Wells for several years.

This paneling is a sculpted MDF and can be painted, stained, or a 3-D laminate can be applied. The patterns that Panelmax has available are endless, and look great in so many ways. William Miller Design's most recent interior design project at a residence in The Reserve in Indian Wells, California featured Panelmax on the dining room ceiling. The set of ABC's show "Castle" features Panelmax on the walls (photo courtesy of ABC) also features Panelmax as well as local retailer Trina Turk.

Panelmax is crafted from 100% pre-consumer recycled hardwood fiber product and is considered eco-friendly.

Accessories Add Sparkle!

With money on our minds these days (and who isn’t thinking about cash?) one of the best ways to get a fresh look with out a large expenditure is by updating and adding accessories. Accessories can add personality, character and texture to any room.

Groupings of like items can provide dramatic visual impact and single accessories such as a large vase with an interesting finish, can sparkle as the focal point of any room. My favorites this season are from a company called Cyan Design whose design philosophy is
“beautiful things for beautiful lives.” Cyan Design offers unique sculptures in iron at attractive prices as well as glass containers and bowls that have dynamic fresh looks. Their glass pieces can be applied as shelf décor because of their sparkle and lightness.

Texture and warmth can be added easily with wonderful baskets from Palecek. This company offers unique shapes and textures as well as rich finishes that make them an extraordinary collection of basketry. One such grouping of these woven works of art can go a long way toward make a statement of textural interest that can enhance a table or shelf.

If making the most of your interior design budget is on your mind, Call us about our interior accessory packages with pricing from $850.00. Our Interior Design Office is located in Palm Desert. We provide interior design services to the desert communities of Palm Desert, Rancho Mirage, La Quinta, and Palm Springs.

Inside-Out Living!

As the summer months are upon us, thoughts turn to outdoor activities and the spaces to enjoy them.

Outdoor living areas are an essential part of today’s lifestyle, and indoor/outdoor living spaces with continuity is essential to a pleasing flow and design. This is especially so in the desert communities of Palm Springs, Palm Desert, and Rancho Mirage, where out relatively mild weather allows us to be outside more of the year. From Tuscan style to contemporary, outdoor spaces considered essential to harmonious living, dining, entertaining and relaxing. Expanding the overall livable square footage of a home is easily achieved if these outdoor spaces are considered and designed from the beginning of the design process.

The best interior design creates a smooth transition from indoors to outdoors is choice in materials. An interior designer will often select wall finishes, flooring, paint colors and fixtures that will carry from the interior space to the outdoor living areas. For example, repeating a granite or stone slab material that was chosen for the kitchen counter or interior wet bar, to the exterior fireplace surround creates continuity. Wall treatments such as Italian plaster, natural stone and faux finishes can also be used indoors as well as outdoors to further design continuity.

Today’s outdoor rooms are not your average backyard spaces. They are extensions of your interior living space that can be enhanced significantly by an interior designer. These spaces incorporate televisions, fireplaces, wet bars, and in some cases even outdoor kitchens. This integration of outdoor living rooms, kitchens, televisions and entertainment systems, bars and even outdoor showers; are essential components in creating a lifestyle experience to which most home owners aspire.

Comfortable seating is a must- and of course, a functional and relaxing dining area, which is just as important to plan for as the architecture. Choices in furnishings and colors to coordinate with the interior of the home will further a feeling of continuity, making the outdoor living space seem like an interior extension.

Thoughtful planning by your interior designer that incorporates architectural overhangs, heating, lighting and comfortable durable materials are the foundation of effective outdoor rooms.