....the designer must be able to see - make a concentrated effort to absorb the essence of the project. Seeing is a very difficult thing to do. Most people "look" at a lot of thing but never "see" anything. Looking is emotional; seeing is an intellectual process.

The essence of interior design will always be about people and how they live.

To create an interior, the designer must develop an overall concept and stick to it.

The one thing I never get involved with is selecting art or pictures for a client. This is a very personal thing. If the clients have pictures, I will hang them. When they do not own pictures I leave the walls blank.

An interior designer must be able to clarify his intent keeping ever in mind that decorating is not a look, it's a point of view.

Decorating is not about making stage sets, it's not about making pretty pictures for the magazines, it's really about creating a quality of life, a beauty that nourishes the soul.

So many young decorators are trying to reinvent the wheel, and the results are sometimes very dubious. They're striving to do things that have never been done before. Quite often it is done without authority, without knowledge, and without a background in taste. They need to be educated about the past, and they need a richer vocabulary.