My Interior Design Blog

hey guys,

I know I promised to explain and guide you regarding the cardboard furniture. But, I didn’t have enough time today to write it at home because all of the preparation for the new year, and now I’m at my boyfriend’s dad place, so it’s a little hectic here to do anything. I sneaked to the office just to let you know that I didn’t forget and I will write everything in my next post, promise!!!

So, what else left to say but HAPPY NEW YEAR, may this year bring you joy, prosperity, love and most of all, success in your design projects and home decor

love ya guys, cya next year- Elina Pinis

Sorry I haven’t been around the last two days, I had the worse migraine headache ever… I woke up with it, and went to bed with it, it’s just can’t be described.

Last time we were talking about the home test that everybody has to have. This post we are going to discuss the Admission Portfolio itself. So, let’s start with the requirements, you need to have between 20 to 30 projects. They all could be drawn, or you can also have some 3D objects like; pottery, woodwork etc’

In my portfolio it’s pretty obvious that I chose to stay closer to the 2dimensional projects. From the simple reason that it is the safest area for me, even though I didn’t have experience with it as well. How did I know what to do and with what medium to use? Well, I was fortunate enough to have find a girl on craigslist that gave away free samples for people who major in Interior Design. When I came to pick up the samples I have brought along my portfolio, well part of it, to be exact since I had only 3 or 4 drawings done. She was really nice and agreed to take a look at what I have done so far and I didn’t like the look on her face when she flipped the pages. “Is it good?” I asked. She smiled at me and said, “I’m sorry to say, but everything is wrong.” She started pointing out things, I almost started crying, than she said something that changed everything. “FIT are not a big fond of color pencils, try to use prismacolor markers, they are the best!” She showed me 3 of her drawings from her admission portfolio. It didn’t look too complicated to execute. The same day I went on eBay and ordered 72 markers (by the way, eBay is the cheapest place to buy those markers, don’t buy them at stores!!)

When I got the markers I started drawing, but it was wrong. Everything was wrong. I was disappointed with myself, I thought it would be the easiest part, but it turned out to be the hardest. I tried to look online for portfolio examples but I didn’t find anything. There are two options, either I didn’t look hard enough, or there was nothing to look for. That’s when I decided to write this blog, I know it took me a while, but better later than never The next step was just to look for interior pictures that I like and try to mimic them. No, not copy, and there is a big difference.

The evaluators are not expecting you to have a previous technical knowledge of sketching or drafting. They want to make sure that you have the potential to learn. Than what are they looking at?

• They are looking at your color coordination, you don’t have to be a genius to know if two colors go together, just have to have a good taste.
• They are also looking for some since of perspective, I mean if you need to draw rails that are starting from the point closest to you and continuing to a dimension that does not exist on a piece of paper, they want to see that you have the logical since to make it wider in the bottom and skinnier in the top.

The two projects that stand out the most in my portfolio are the last two, which are cardboard furniture. Yes, you read it correctly, cardboard furniture. I know there must be a lot of questions regarding it, like; “Is it durable enough?” “How hard is it to make?” “can you actually sit on it?” “Does all of it made out of cardboard?” Well, if you want an answer to those questions and directions for your own cardboard furniture you’ll probably will read the next post

The day before yesterday was a movie day. My boyfriend and I went to the movie theater since a lot of great movies premiered on Christmas day. We chose to watch Valkyrie, since usually movies that are based on true stories are the best. We enjoyed it, bu it wasn’t something outstanding like we hoped it would be. After the movie ended we started going towards the exit and than we saw that another movie is about to start The Tale of Despereaux. Again, it was a cute movie but we agreed that it’s one of those movies for kids, not like other animation movies that are also fit for adults.

That was just a little review for you guys, and now I’ll continue my Interior Design journey. Now, if you remember the last post I uploaded my admission portfolio. Don’t get scared about the elevations you see there you don’t have to have those in your portfolio. But I’m going to talk about it next time, now I’ll explain the home test.

The first one is another essay you need to write. This time you should include in it: why you chose FIT, your career goals, and what do you think Interior Design is all about. My only and the most important advise is not to tell them how since you were a baby you dreamed, ate, and breathed FIT. It won’t work! everybody write about it.. And they know how good they are, they wont to hear about you!!!

The second home test is to sketch a room or a floor plan. If you are good in drawing, go ahead and choose the room sketch since it will be more colorful and show your talent. If not, the floor plan is the better choice for you. Don’t be scared, floor plans are easy you just need to know how to do it in scale. That was my problem, I came from the metric system and inches made no sense to me. (Plus, if you’ll keep reading the blog I’ll explain later on more about scale and floor plans).

The third one is to sketch a piece of furniture that you find interesting. I think for this you need to go online and look for something that catches your eye, don’t worry if it has a real purpose or not, they are just going to ask you why you chose this, and why you find it interesting. With the piece I chose I think you can see why I chose it…

The final and I believe the most important test is to design a functional object or a piece of furniture by relating it to an artist, or it’s better to say to an artists work. You don’t know any artist? That’s fine. I didn’t know anyone ether. What I decided to do is to go to Wikipedia and looked for a list of architects or designers, than I went one by one and googled them. After a long search I found an Architect I really liked her style; Patricia Urquiola Bergere. It’s important to explain to the people who interview you how do you think you portrayed the artist of your choice style and how it comes through. In my case, as you may see at first sight the picture and the drawings are not similar at all, but I wanted not to portray only that particular chandelier but the general style of Patricia, which is traditional with touches of modern. Like the chandelier, the piece itself and its lines are very traditional, but the material and colors are the most modern you can get.

First of all, I think it would be appropriate to apologize about yesterday, I mean that I didn’t write anything. My friend was leaving for a vacation back to her country so I spent most of my day at her place. After I left, I went strait to Manhattan, to meet my boyfriend and we went together to a birthday party. You would never guess where the party was… No, try again… I can see you impatient, so I’ll just tell you; it was at “Lucky Cheng’s” it’s a drug queen place, where they host, take your food order and dance. The food was good, but when you go there you pay mostly for the show, and the show is great. They interact with the guests and they even have a mini competition, but I won’t tell you what it is, you would have to go there and find out by yourself.

And now back to our business, last time I told you about the essay that you have to present as part of the requirements. The next stage would be to get a letter (1, 2, 3) saying that you are invited to an “in person portfolio evaluation”. Now, if you are living more than 200 miles from NYC you can just send your portfolio by mail. But, and it’s a big but, since there is no interview for FIT it is suggested to present your portfolio in person, because you can defend some of your work, and/or explain what were you thinking when you did this or that.

In addition, this letter also contains “information” on what should be in the portfolio and a home test. I put the information in quotes because it is unsuffisiant. I mean, to someone who has no expirience in the art field it’s all very confusing. When I tried to look online for examples I didn’t find anything. So, what I’m going to do is upload my admission portfolio which obviasly passed the FIT inspection.

Good evening readers,

Today I’ll start telling you about my journey, at least I’ll try. I applied to FIT, and one of their requirements was to write an essay telling them why I want to go to their institute and just tell them about myself. Usually when people tell about themselves it’s very generic and boring, same old stuff like, where you were born, how many siblings etc’ I wanted to be different. I can’t even start telling you how nervous I was. I never wrote anything like this before; I didn’t know where to start. I have started imagining my chances of getting accepted shrinking every second. Plus, the essay was supposed to be 350 to 750 words. “How could I know the best number?” I thought, “It could be too short or too long who knows what they expect?”

I decided to go with a different approach. Not trying to impress them with what I have done (because I didn’t do anything deserving anyway.) I thought I need to speak to their hearts, but since I had no idea who is going to read it, I mean group age, or gender I had to find something that talks to everybody. I thought about it for about a week, and then it hit me. How come I didn’t think about it before?! Parents, everybody loves their parents, and for most people the parents are their idol. Luckily my dad is a civil engineer so that his profession is close to interior design.

Here is my final essay:

I remember my father taking me as a young girl to an unfinished construction project. He showed me one empty room after another and said: “These are offices for people to work in”. I didn’t believe him.”But, dad, these are just empty rooms and hallways. They don’t even have windows or doors”. “Right now it’s just a dream, but if I work hard enough, it will all come true”, he said. I didn’t believe him because I didn’t believe in magic.

Necessity is the mother of invention and when old thing break down and you are poor you “renovate”. I’ve displayed creative abilities since an early age. Our family had limited financial means but my father was always renovating and improving our home. Starting from little help with paint or tiles I’ve “graduated” to having my own pet project to design, budget and manage. One day, I was bold enough to tell my father that I could take complete care of a room, top to bottom and that I wanted a chance to prove myself. Since the room was small a good planning was crucial, I had to fit a bed, computer desk, a dresser and off course a vanity. After the floor plan was figured out the real fun begun, painting the room choosing the curtains and then I wondered, “Do I have enough money for all this stuff?” I have decided to go “dumpster diving” after collecting my “new” furniture, some sending, painting and a lot of sweat and tears involved, all was a matter of time until everything was finished, on time and on budget.

Original ideas arise when different cultures collide. My Eastern European background combined with Middle Eastern upbringing will be fertile ground for Western Design education in the heart of New York. Dreams and hard work are important. But education is the foundation that everything starts from. Education at the Fashion Institute of Technology is a prerequisite for my making any contribution be it small or great.

My father has been an inspiration and a role model. His hard work and dedication to pursuing his dreams have been my guiding principles in life. One day I hope to take him to an empty building and say “These are offices for people to work in” and know that this time he will believe me because it will not just be a dream.

So, what do you think? I personally think it is touching, after I read the whole thing i swear I felt a tear appearing.

Well, that’s all for today, just remember that you don’t have to write those generic boring essays, try to find something that is dear to you, and people who will read it will notice, I promise.

Dear friends,

Welcome to my blog, I am happy to announce that this is officially the first post. First, I wanted to wish happy Hanuka since today is the first candle lighting. Just for general information, Hanuka is a Jewish holiday also known by the name “Festival of Lights”. It lasts 8 days and every day you light an additional candle until the 8th day, when the entire Menorah is full. The traditional dish for this Holiday is doughnuts with raspberry jelly, yammy.

If you have read about me you would have known that I’m currently enrolling in FIT. In this blog I will try to tell my story from the beginning, from the point that I decided to go to FIT. I’ll try to write and describe our assignments, explain the grading methods and basically help you if you are considering the interior design profession.

I’ll try to write every day, I don’t want to promise it because I don’t like promising things that I’m not sure I can accomplish. Hopefully my little experience will help you, since I know I looked for this kind of information and didn’t find a really good resource.

So, I hope you’ll enjoy our time here, and if you have any questions please I urge you not to be shy and ask whatever is on your mind. Thanks and happy holidays.

Yours truly,
Elina Pinis – Interior Designer in the making.