Jackson Ferguson, AIA // FFKR

Jackson Ferguson is a principal at FFKR Architects. Jackson was working here in Rexburg for a few years on projects located on BYU-Idaho’s campus. He worked on the remodel of the Manwaring Center and the new BYU-I Center. Mr. Ferguson was able to show students the building and design processes of both of these buildings and the design problems that were solved.

Patricia Smith of PWS Home Design

Patricia is an alumna from BYU-Idaho (formerly Ricks College). She is now the owner of PWS Home Design. Patricia advised students on how to draft faster and more efficiently using AutoCAD and different skills she’s found usefully throughout her career.  She also gave students tips on how to effectively operate a successful business out of their own home. 

Jeanette Simpson, RID, ASID

Jeanette H. Simpson is a professional member of ASID, an NCIDQ Certificate holder and a licensed Interior Designer in Florida. Her commercial design experience also includes hiring, training, and mentoring interns and new employees. As a mother, grandmother, coach, and teacher, Jeanette has spent her life teaching youth the value of a strong work ethic. She is the owner of KidSpace Interiors, specializing in design of children’s spaces. She is the Author of “From Interior Design Intern to Employee: How to be a Keeper”. 

Thank you for coming Jeanette!


 For more on Jeanette visit:

www.kidspaceinteriors.com

www.interntoemplyee.com

LaRayne Lundell, IIDA

LaRayne was the IIDA Southwest Chapter VP of Professional Development. She is both an Interior Designer and Project Manager. LaRayne advised students on different professional situations and how to plan life and work to fit together. She shared many of her design projects with students and explained how she came to solve design problems for those projects. 

Russ and Tamara Rowley

Russ Rowley is a representative for Mountain West Marketing. He represents Delta and Brizo brands for residential kitchen and bath fixtures. He showed students the different products he supplies and the new products that are coming out in the next year. 

 

Tamara Rowley is a designer at Schumacher Tile and Stone. She designs residential kitchen and baths. Tamara shared projects that she has worked on and some samples of the Schumacher Tile and Stone company. 

 

Kevin Eutsler of Dyno Nobel Inc.

Kevin Eutsler is a Senior Training Manager for Dyno Nobel Inc. He showed students the various personality types and how to interact with one another. He gave tips on how to read people and to adjust your work habits to work with someone of another personality type. The four personalities types are the guardians, the idealists, the artisans, and the rationals. Each of the personalities has different characteristics, values, and motto's that make up who they are. Learning about each of these personalities helps us to better understand people and allows is to better communicate and interact with every personality.

Kevin gave us four basic communication rules:


1. I spoke without thinking is totally untrue
2. Listening is under-valued, under-learned, and under-utilized
3. Who I am dictates How I am; How I am dictates What I do
4. We don’t see the world as it is; we see the world as we are

Meditation and Mindfulness by Gary Purse

Gary Purse from the BYU-Idaho Religion department and Gwenaelle Couliard a BYU-Idaho counselor came and met with students to discuss the benefits and techniques of meditation. Meditation is a beneficial practice that can help students to eliminate stress from their lives. “Neuroscientists have found that meditators shift their brain activity to different areas of the cortex - brain waves in the stress-prone right frontal cortex move to the calmer left frontal cortex. This mental shift decreases the negative effects of stress, mild depression and anxiety. The researchers found that the meditators showed a pronounced shift in activity to the left frontal lobe. In other words, they were calmer and happier than before.” (The Benefits of Meditation: Psychology Today, by Colin Allen, Apr 24 '03).
Other meditation benefits include:
 -Increases activation of left frontal regions, which lifts mood (Davidson 2004).  
 -Decreases stress-related cortisol (Tang et al. 2007).
 -Strengthens the immune system (Davidson et al. 2003; Tang et al. 2007).
 -Helps a variety of medical conditions, including cardiovascular disease, asthma, type II diabetes, PMS, and chronic pain (Walsh and Shapiro 2006). 
 -Helps numerous psychological conditions, including insomnia, depression, anxiety, phobias, and eatingdisorders (Walsh and Shapiro 2006)(http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/12/06/mindfulness-as-good-as-antidepressant-drugs-study-says/)

 Emily Thompson, owner of Cure Touch Massage Therapy, conducted a workshop with students to teach them proper massage techniques and the positive effects it can have on one’s body. 

2007 Graduates

Kathryn Evans, Summer Findley, Brittany Ruch, all graduates of BYU-Idaho’s Interior Design program. The graduates came to talk to students about life after graduation, the process of finding a job, and the differences of working on school projects and working on real life projects. They also gave students pointers on do’s and don’ts for the work place. 

Connie Edwards of Waypoint Living Spaces

 Connie Edwards, CKD, CBD has spent more than thirty years in the kitchen and bath Industry. She is Director of Design for Waypoint Living Spaces.
Connie was invited to come and lecture as well as be a judge for our GE Charette student competition. She shared her design insights with students by showing many projects she has worked on. Connie also showed us many examples of her company’s cabinetry designs. She also explained the process it takes to stage a set or home for her magazine.

Tamara Young of Stark

Tamara Young is Stark's Representative to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  Tamara Came to BYU-Idaho to give a presentation of many Stark products. She displayed a video that showed the special manufacturing process that custom Stark carpet goes through. Some of the products she was able to share with the students ranged from tapestries to wallpaper and to fabric. 

Design Graduates Reunite!

Lindsay Call and Sara Prowess offered helpful information about their everyday design work and accomplishments at their respective design firms, Wynn Design and Development and Yates-Silverman, Inc.  Each described the work they do on a typical day in the real interior design world.  They shared stories, outlined their scope of responsibilities, their preparation, and their experiences in their current careers.  They were great inspirations to us all of what we can be capable of if we keep working hard.  Their success showed that in the end all the blood, sweat, tears, and late nights, are worth it in the end!  Thanks for coming and sharing your great insights with us!

Bookmaking Class!

Thanks to Cassie Grace we all now have fabulous bookmaking skills! Cassie showed us all the secrets behind creating the perfect handmade stab-binding book. We all had a wonderful time learning this valuable skill!

Michael Fazio

Do you remember the Magazine Game that Michael Fazio from ArchIdeas introduced? What about the link between "shopping for shoes" and interior design?? We were very lucky to have Mr. Fazio deliver dynamic presentations with valuable information on becoming a better designer. He expressed that to be a good designer, you must always be looking for ways to improve your environment. Some of the most important tips Mr. Fazio presented included:

Learn to SEE - Look for activities, environments, information, objects, and users in a space (including seeing what is missing in the space)

Delight in Failure - Force yourself to try a different approach to a problem.

• Ask "Why?" and "Why not?"
• Choose a Good and Right Path
• Never Stop Learning

Mr. Fazio also reminded students to keep design and careers in perspective; after the wise words of Einstein, "Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted..."

We were so fortunate to have the talented Mr. Fazio with us in our department for a day!

Don't forget the Powerpoint files from his presentations are posted on I-Learn for your personal access!

Alumni Student Panel

This week's design seminar gave students the opportunity to hear first-hand about post-graduate experiences from three industry professionals who previously attended BYU-Idaho's Interior Design program. Students were also given the chance to ask the panel questions about living life with commercial interior design. The panel was comprised of Cherie Terry of Kimball Systems Furniture, Justin Morris of FFKR, and Keri Wood who worked with Tanporan, GRAD, Gensler, and SNS.

Top 10 Words of Advice from the Panel:

• "Experts don't compete. They redefine the rules."
• Get involved. Do service. Interior design is about making sure everyone's needs are taken care of, not just the high-end clients.
• Do all you can to learn and prepare now. There is never time to re-do a half-done job.
• Have confidence. You have been given the tools to do a good job.
• Design is important, but there's more to life than design. Keep priorities straight. Be well-rounded and remember family first.
• Always do things for the right reason: the Lord is the perfect designer.
• Explore all the options and keep an open mind. Evaluate the work environment before taking a job.
• Don't just "get through" a project; attack it head on!
• It's all about attitude. If you want to stay around, you have to take initiative, manage yourself, volunteer to help others, be a teamplayer, and be proficient at what you do.
• If you want the job, do all you can to get an insider's name, research the firm, contact them, send your resume, and be confident and persistent with a followup.