Interior Design: Education, Schools and Jobs

You have decorated your room at the age of 12, you helped decorate your parent’s home at 14 and from the age of 15 aunts, relatives and friends have been coming to you for decorating tips. You know what colors look good together, you know how placement of furniture works, you know how to arrange furniture aesthetically and you know what kind of lighting works best.

So, have you thought of the very obvious career choice? Interior designing is obviously your forte and something that can be very lucrative for you.

Interior Design Schools and Education

You may have decided to become an interior designer, but just some experience in decorating homes is not going to help you become a great interior designer with the most coveted jobs. You need some formal education for interior designing. These schools are going to deal with a technical stuff that you never knew you needed. These schools will teach you about history of interior designing, computer aided drawing and designing, architecture and space planning. There are certain rules and regulations that all students of interior design need to be aware of, such as those about fire laws, handicap access, sound and lighting design and building regulations. All of these are important from the technicality part of interior design.

Every interior design student needs to clear National Council for Interior Design Qualification or NCIDQ Exam. This exam is of extreme importance as it gives the student the required credentials to become a qualified interior designer. These interior design schools prepare the students for this exam. But remember there are some qualification criteria for this exam. The student has to have six years of experience including interior design education and must include two years of post secondary education.

If you cannot go to a regular school for interior design education, there are always other options, and these days the Internet makes anything possible. There are countless online Interior Design degrees available and many of these are accredited. They give lecture and studio lessons from a school close to you. You can choose to do this if you are working and do not want to quit for a full time course.

Interior Design Jobs on the rise

In the yester years not a lot of people use interior designers, but these days almost every person wants their space and environment to be appealing and different. There are millions of clients out there who do not mind shelling out big bucks for something different and classy. The television is also not far behind, see the talk shows and reality shows, at least one out of every ten will have a decorating piece included.

Home interiors and office interiors are just a small section in the mix, hotels, restaurants, law firms are all places that need to be visually enhanced, which means what you see is what you get. Even clinics, spas and salons are not far behind on this decorating bandwagon. And ad agencies, art galleries and corporate head offices are always a step ahead in the game of interior design.

And its not just the creativity that is important, which doesn’t mean that you undermine the creativity involved in interior design, but skill is a big factor involved in getting exciting interior design jobs. And if you want to own your own interior design firm, what is stopping you? Just remember to take extra course in marketing, merchandising and business psychology to give you that extra edge in the market.