Twins Alisa and Lysandra, two-time contestants of The Block, spent a day in and out of interiors stores to revise and strengthen their design and business skills.
There’s no doubt Alisa and Lysandra have plenty of talent and good eyes for design. Their winning transformations on The Block are testament to their amazing instincts which, with time, will only get stronger when paired with a foundation of knowledge.
Click the image to view the video!
As Lysandra recently wrote in her guest post , instinct is great but it’s also helpful to learn the principles that sit behind why a room looks good. The twins undertook an Institute of Home Staging mentoring package with me following the completion of two courses—The Art of Home Staging (Course 1) and Advanced Home Staging (Course 2)—and a workshop.
This video shows Alisa a Lysandra undertaking a one-day workshop with me, click here to check it out.
The courses enhance students’ skills and knowledge on the art and business of making homes attractive to buyers. While The Art of Home Staging is great for the basics, I highly recommend those going into business to take the Advanced Home Staging course as it offers a deeper insight into home staging principles, including specific modules on colour and light and living spaces as well as dealing with clients through consultations and installations.
The purpose of the above workshop was to revise what the twins had learnt in both courses. The first half focused on the modules of work they had completed, hence lots of sketching, notes and coffee!
The second half of the workshop looked at developing a design and styling business. This goes beyond the actual skills of home staging and covers things like what offerings to have, what products to deliver, and how to price them, which is why we visited a few interiors stores to get a fuller picture.
Another aspect many business owners forget is how to value and manage their time. When you’re passionate about styling, it’s so easy to fall into a time trap (ever been absorbed by looking at swatches for hours?) when you need to learn to prioritise and work effectively. For interiors specialists packaging and using your intellectual property is a key element as well.
Since the twins now run their own online homewares store, Alisa & Lysandra Collections, and their careers will for the foreseeable future be in the interiors sector, it was not only important to establish the principles of design, but to make sure they were confident in going forward as a business.
Click here to see highlights of the day.
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