064: Growing an International Luxury Interior Design Studio with Rachel Laxer and Beth Clancy

This week on the Business of Architecture UK, I visit Rachel Laxer Interiors, an Luxury Interior Design Studio based in London and New York with a portfolio of international work.

In this interview principal Rachel Laxer and senior design director Beth Clancy discuss their working relationship, how Rachel began the studio and the details of how they manage their client’s budgets and vision.

Themes explored in this interview:
– Making the transition into commercial work from private residential
– Financial management for projects
– How and what’s it like to work with Architects

TODAY’S RESOURCES

Architect’s Marketing Institute 1-2-1 Breakthrough Call Application
www.businessofarchitecture.co.uk/marketing-breakthrough

Rachel Laxer Interiors
http://rlaxerinteriors.com

063: Business Systems for an Architecture Practice with Maria Mustapha

In this week’s interview I speak with Maria Mustapha, a business strategist and director of JMA Projects, a Business Systems Consultancy that helps Interior Designers and Architects work smarter and build a 21st century business with better processes & technology.

With a background in a number of various industries from engineering and construction, branding and marketing, to software development projects, Maria has a unique insight into the constraints many new architectural businesses face.

In this interview you will learn:

– What are the most important and first systems you need to have in place in your architecture business
– What questions should you ask to a qualify a prospective client before you start working together
– What time consuming activities you should and can be outsourcing and what technology can be used to automate routine tasks

TODAY’S RESOURCES

Architect’s Marketing Institute 1-2-1 Breakthrough Call Application
www.businessofarchitecture.co.uk/marketing-breakthrough

Work with Maria at JMA Projects
https://jma-projects.co.uk

062: What Happens When An Anthropologist Studies Architects at Work? with Dr Thomas Yarrow

I was absolutely delighted and fascinated to meet this week’s guest on the Business of Architecture UK. Dr Thomas Yarrow is an Anthropologist at the University of Durham, who has recently completed an ethnographical study of architects at work, through an intimate observational collaboration with architecture practice, Millar Howard Workshop.

Dr Thomas Yarrow completed his undergraduate degree in archaeology and anthropology at Cambridge University before undertaking his PhD in social anthropology also at Cambridge University, completed 2006. After completing his PhD he held a Leverhulme fellowship in anthropology at the University of Manchester. He has also lectured in anthropology at the Centre of West African Studies, University of Birmingham and at the School of Environment Natural Resources and Geography, at the University of Wales, Bangor.

His book ‘Architects: Portraits of Practice’ explores the ‘struggle & doubts of the design process’ & ‘explores the architect’s world of anxiety, exhilaration, hope, idealism, friendship, conflict & personal commitment that feeds creativity’.

In this Interview the following themes are explored and reflected upon

• The Revolution of the Everyday – how our sense of a utopian future can obscure the utopias of the everyday
• The potential for the future of the architect is lies in our ability to thoughtfully reconcile complexity
• Why the real power of the architect is our confidence in dealing with the uncertainty of ‘not knowing’.

TODAY’S RESOURCES

Architect’s Marketing Institute 1-2-1 Breakthrough Call Application
www.businessofarchitecture.co.uk/marketing-breakthrough

Architects: Portrait of a Practice
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Architects-Portraits-Expertise-Technologies-Knowledge/dp/1501738496

Millar Howard Workshop
https://www.mhworkshop.co.uk

Dr Thomas Yarrow
https://www.dur.ac.uk/research/directory/staff/?id=9727