Despite the fact that my first words were "home builder," my design career didn't bloom until I was about the ripe old age of seven, in a very unlikely place: Nogales, Arizona.  I spent my weekends and summers at my great-grandmother's house, the only child among many elderly aunties and two grandmothers. 

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The house was built in 1919 on land that my great-great grandfather had homesteaded. This land was right on the Mexican border. When I was a child there was only an eight foot tall chain link fence with a little razor wire wrapped haphazardly along the top. 

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Our adobe house was a palace compared with our neighbors to the south- or, at least we had running water and electricity. Their houses were made of cardboard and sheets of corrugated metal- whatever they could find.  They would run to the fence and we would run a hose through so they could fill their water buckets. 

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Being a child there with nothing to do, I would spend hours sitting on our front porch, armed with a pad of paper, a ruler and a Sears catalog. I would spend all day designing houses specifically for my neighbors: if they had two kids, they would get this model of house; for four kids, I would design another.

 

I learned about scale, flow and functionality. I learned to visualize the 2-d image into a 3-d space that I could walk through in my mind to experience every nook and cranny, making sure it was livable and beautiful. I learned to design for a specific client.

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My favorite part was searching the Sears catalog and creating elaborate lists of items based on the stories I had made up about these imaginary families. I was blissfully unaware that this was preparing me to create future FF&E schedules for clients. 

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I would choose everything from pots and pans to towels, holiday decorations, furniture and lamps. Everything. My mission was to do more than simply provide shelter; it was to create home.

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After twenty-six years in high end residential construction came to an end, I closed my practice and gave up on the idea of having building and design in my life.

 

Your life purpose, however, doesn't simply go away. Design is all around us and it is what I live and breathe. It is definitely meant to be a part of my life. It's why I'm here.

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So I decided to re-open my practice and enlarge my vision of what interior design means. Here we go again!

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I look forward to connecting with you- if not in person, at least virtually. Find me on Instagram and watch for my design vlog, Rill Life, on YouTube! 

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Cheers!

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   Julie

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