One of my guilty pleasures as an interior design photographer is getting a glimpse inside other people’s homes. Call me crazy or even creepy (I promise I am not :)), but I have always been so fascinated by design and what makes someone’s house, a home…to them!
For most of my childhood, this fascination stemmed from thinking I would become an interior designer. Back in 2015 I wrote this post where I shared my very yellow room from Junior High, with a carefully selected chair rail and perfectly placed NSYNC posters.
I think people have always known about my fascination because I constantly get messages from my friends, showing me their newly decorated living rooms..bathrooms..bedrooms. And asking for advice on how to choose items for their homes. It’s something that makes me so happy, but contrary to my childhood dreams.. I know for certain I was never supposed to work as an interior designer.
When I first became a photographer, I never considered a world outside of weddings and portraits. I didn’t know there was a space for interior design photography or how a person ever made it into commercial photography. But life has a way of bringing you to the work you’re meant to be doing and I’m so glad mine led me to what I do now.
Someone asked me several weeks ago if I feel like there is much purpose in my work now that I shoot interior design rather than weddings. I understood the curiosity of the question because interior design isn’t quite as monumental as a wedding day.. on the surface at least.
There are a lot of reasons why photographing interior design holds value to me, but I want to share one of the main reasons today.
But just like any small business, designers provide a service and work hard to create a life for their families, outside of the luxury of design. And this important part of owning and operating any business is what I started to think about when I was asked the question of how shooting design holds value to me.
A photograph and what it means.
As an interior design photographer, I get to help small businesses. I’m able to connect with other women and men pursuing their own dream careers and give them a tangible, valuable piece of their project…a photograph of it.
A photograph they can use on their website, their social media, their Houzz page, a photo that might be published in a local or national magazine, showing off their hard work.
The why.
Shooting interior design is so much more than just photographing a beautiful space. And although shooting a beautiful space is also one of my favorite parts of this work that I do, it isn’t the whole of it.
Helping small business owners achieve the goal to have their project photographed
Seeing them light up when we frame the shot “just right” on-location
Watching their work go viral on social media
Turning the pages of a national magazine and seeing the combined efforts of a designers work and my photograph achieve a publication
Opening up a designers website and seeing their projects displayed with photos I have taken across the front page, all through out their portfolio and marketing materials
At the end of the day, it’s my biggest hope that when a designer (or contractor…I see you Tankersley Construction :)) works with me, they leave with photographs that shows off the months and sometimes years of hard work they dedicated to their project.
This is one of the main reasons I believe there is so much value in the work of photographing interior design and I am so grateful this is my path.
At one point or another you might entertain the idea of having one of your finished projects professionally photographed. With that comes a bit of preparation to make sure the shoot runs smoothly and we get the best possible shots for you that day.
Below, I have outlined 3 ways to prep your space to make sure your interior design shoot runs smoothly and your project is photo ready.
Have the space professionally cleaned.
A clean space photographs best! I can’t tell you how many times I have wiped off construction dust from a kitchen shelf mid-shoot, had to clean out a kitchen sink upon arrival or pile kids toys in the back bedroom out of sight. Though I don’t mind being helpful, it’s much easier if these things are taken care of pre-shoot so we spend less time prepping and more time shooting once the session begins.
Remove all client belongings that don’t reflect your own aesthetic.
Piggy-backing off of a professionally cleaned space, it’s equally important to prep the space with design appropriate accessories. By this I mean, removing your client’s family portraits, knick-knacks and dog dishes (I promise it won’t hurt your client’s feelings) and replacing them with accessories that fit your personal design aesthetic.
Think kitchen towels, soap dispensers, plates, bowls and mugs for styling kitchen shelves, plants, rugs, pillows, blankets, candles etc. Once you have a small arsenal of accessories you can bring this to all of your shoots and quickly touch up any project before a shoot.
Have all overhead and decorative lighting turned off.
I shoot with mostly natural light so any artificial lighting within a space can alter the color of a space fairly drastically by casting a tungsten glow over the photo. So it’s easiest to gauge lighting within the space and see what I’m working with if I walk into an already natural-lit space. Sometimes it takes upwards of 10-15 minutes walking through a home to shut off all overhead and decorative lighting and every minute counts when we’re shooting with natural light! So it’s definitely best to take care of this step before the photographer arrives.
Bonus points if all of these things are done before shoot-time begins so we can get to work on photographing your project! :)
These are just a few things to help you prep your project for shoot day. Hopefully they’re helpful as you navigate prepping for your next project to be photographed!
Image above from a project I photographed with Design Shop Interiors.
Here we are, 8 months postpartum and I feel like I can finally speak with confidence on the do’s and don’ts of a baby registry. You certainly don’t need all of these things, but they do make life easier when you’re in the chaos of figuring out how to care for both yourself and a new baby in this season.
But rather than writing an entirely new post dedicated to this, I’ve done something similar to Almost Makes Perfect and updated my baby registry post here with notes on what we did and didn’t use, and how I ended up liking the items I invested in.
I also included a new section with items we didn’t purchase up front but ended up being some of our must-haves! I hope you find it helpful as you gather the essentials for your new little love.
Jack’s nursery is finally all done and it’s the best room in my house! This was by far my most favorite project during pregnancy. I had never designed a room start to finish until this one and it was such a fun thing to focus on while the rest of my life was in total chaos. This room was a safe place for me and I knew I would clock many, many hours in here with my little boy on the way so it was important for me to create a very special space.
I wanted this room to be bright and earthy with fun pops of color, and fairly gender neutral. So, I drew a lot of inspiration from accounts on instagram and browsing Pinterest…and of course the girls at Design Shop, because I had to run every purchase by them first haha…sorry Ash ;)
Three rugs, two gliders and several returns later…we have a finished nursery that I’m so excited to share!
There are so many personal touches in this room that mean a lot to me so here’s where I’ll fill you in on those and get sentimental for a sec:
The rainbow…I love the trend of rainbows in nurseries, I think it’s so so cute. But for me? The rainbow is a symbol of God’s faithfulness and His promises to us. I wanted that in Jack’s room because we need to be reminded DAILY of God’s promises and be reminded that He loves His kids so much and wants to restore them during hard times. The first month of Jack’s life, he would look up at the rainbow and smile every single day! He wasn’t “supposed” to start smiling until 2 months but he started at 2 weeks. And one of the first things he smiled in response to was this sweet rainbow. I thought it was so ironic and such a Jesus moment that some of Jack’s earliest smiles were in response to a symbol of God’s promises.
The peace sign…One of my friends put this same peace sign flag above her son’s crib and I loved it the day I saw it but I didn’t want to fullllly copy her design. However, I came across this same peace sign in a different color scheme one day and knew I had to have it in Jack’s room. This peace sign is another symbol to me that God whispers peace over my son and I every single day. My heart has been so anxious for so long but Jesus has not created us with a spirit of fear and anxiety. He is created us to be bold and to be at peace! Every time I walk in his nursery I see a huge reminder over his crib that God is my strength and my PEACE. I want to feel His peace and His faithfulness during this time in mine and Jack’s life and having both the peace sign and rainbow in his room do just that! It’s also kind of ironic to me that Jack will stare at his peace sign for SO long when I lay him in the crib. He giggles at it and stares at it every day. Newborns love black and white so I’m sure that’s why…but it’s still fun to see him love these two special pieces so much!
The birth poster…This poster has all of Jack’s birth measurements on it and it’s scaled to the size he was at birth, 19.5″ long and I just think it’s the sweetest, customized art I’ve ever seen and I’ll have it up in my home forever…even when he’s 18, sorry kid.
I get a lot of compliments on his book shelves, and they are one of my absolute favorite parts of Jack’s room! I can’t take credit for their originality though because I basically just copied Molly from Almost Makes Perfect and bought all of the books she bought so it would look as cute as her son Arlo’s shelves ha… super unoriginal of me but I absolutely love it so I’m cool with being unoriginal here.
Leave your questions below if you have any and I’ll answer in the comments!
Welcome to the blog! You’ll find everything here from portfolio work and tips for new photographers, to personal posts related to motherhood and bits of my home! Stick around to see what’s new each week.
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