Original Publish Date: 08-10-2017

As more and more people tap into their inner creative and/or look to save a few coins, DIY projects is officially a thing - from the stay at home moms to professional interior designers, and everyone in between... EXCEPT ME. I am surrounded by it - television, Pinterest, you name it - especially in my world of not just design, but also being a creative and a mom; but hear me, and hear me good...I refuse to subscribe to doing any substantial amount of DIYing and I am absolutely okay with that. 

Revision Date 09-10-2022

When I’d originally written this post - five whole years ago! - I was in the throws of figuring out how to raise a baby & a business, in addition to recovering from a cross country move. Every online resource I’d turned to was all about being scrappy & just doing it yourself. If there’s one thing I know, it’s how to be scrappy, and I am no stranger to building something from nothing… just grit & perseverance. That said… I also know my limits. While I many be capable of doing many things, it doesn’t mean I have to do everything. I have a deep respect for professionals who work diligently at their craft, which allows me to focus my energies & efforts elsewhere… or simply rest. Being limited on both time & money during this time, I prioritized projects accordingly, and five years later, I am of the same mindset. Some projects, we will happily put in our time & sweat equity. Others require a more practiced hand, so we spend the money. Being a full time interiors content creator also affords us some privilege - payment for projects, product in exchange for projects - in addition to my husband’s full time income. This affords us some latitude oh what we have to do ourselves. It affords us choices.

Since the time of writing this post, a time when I didn’t actually consider myself a content creator or an influencer, so much has changed in this space. A little over 2 years after this post’s original publish date, we were hit with a global pandemic. From state to state, country to country, stay-at-home orders were the norm for months… and this is in addition to people either quarantining and/or transitioning into remote job roles. With more people being home, the emotional value of home increased. People were finally looking around their homes with a readiness to tackle long overdue projects - deficiencies in how their homes functioned to simply making their homes look better. For many people, they finally had the time and/or money to get the work done. With this, we saw a rise in DIY projects -

1. For some, they finally had the time to take care of neglected home improvement projects, yet not the funds to hire out the work. Rather than continue to put it off, this meant lots of YouTube university, learning how master a myriad of home improvement projects, from deck building to drywall installation, and so much more in between.

2. For those with the funds, it now meant finding a contractor with the availability to take on the project. With so many people seeking work to be done, many contractors were booked out as far as 9-12 months. Rather than wait for a pro, they spent that time learning to do the job themselves.

3. Lastly, people predicted the influencer bubble bursting with the pandemic, and it did the opposite. With the rise of TikTok + new features rolled out on Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube, everyone and their mama (in some cases literally) decided to enter the field of influencer marketing, with many sharing home projects as low hanging fruit.

Watching the rise in popularity of DIY home improvement projects didn’t change my mind on the topic, nor did purchasing our home. I still maintain my thought process of prioritizing how we want to spend our time & money, and take each project on a case by case basis, with no desire to DIY full time.

Original Post Continued Below with edits

Time & Patience. 

Both critical in any successful DIY and unfortunately, I don't have any of either to spare, no matter how badly I may want to. I barely have time to commit to my usual day to day obligations, much less to find time to carve out for staining & reupholstering. A lot of times we see this projects , and fall under the false impression that they're quick and easy. Because I do appreciate a good DIY, there are times I would make appropriate suggestions to clients (those who don’t do, teach) and with that, go through the steps with them. No matter what, it is almost always something that you have to be committed to or you're better off just paying for it already done. Knowing I don’t have that kind of commitment in me, I don’t even try to play myself.

My husband, on the other hand, has a bit more patience than I do when it comes to home improvement projects. He loves working with his hands & tinkering about the house + I believe it’s a cathartic break for him, outside of his full time job.

The Cost.

Back when I was an e-designer, I would only ever suggest a DIY project as part of the design when (a) the client requests it or (b) we need cost savings. The same goes for my own home projects. I'll take a holistic look at the entire design and see if/where a DIY makes sense; and even when I choose one, I always have a plan b in my back pocket, because you really just never know. At the time that this post was original written, I’d just completed sourcing all the materials for a client's DIY and compiled a shopping list, separate from the furnishings that were being purchased. After a side by side comparison of the total cost of the materials and the full price tag of a comparable non-DIY item, the price difference was so minimal, it was hardly worth it. Now for some people, it's not about the savings, but more so about the process of completing something that'll live in your home. And in which case, I tip my hat to you. My husband is that way, to some degree. But for me, if I'm going to spend all that time doing whatever it is, it better had saved me a substantial amount of coinage, other I could've spent the money & saved the time. My time is precious. 

Laziness.

There I said it. I'm lazy. And I'm absolutely okay with that, because, first & foremost, let’s normalize using lazy in the way the dictionary intended.

la·zy /ˈlāzē/ adjective

1. unwilling to work or use energy.

For some people, a DIY project releases stress or is a bonding experience. But for me, it's just one more thing to do. Nope. Pass. I am unwilling. The closest I'd come to any kind of DIY at the time of writing the original post was spray painting a few IKEA office pieces & I'll admit, I had to mentally prepare and plan ahead for those. We’ve since tackled a few projects in our new home with our own hands - our launderette & wash room renovations, lighting upgrades through out the house, backsplash in the kitchen, and carpet removal in all 3 bedrooms. And by we… I really mean he, because I still can't imagine penciling in an entire Saturday, if I have it free, to voluntarily not be free. That's time I can spend catching up on sleep, touring my new city, trying a new restaurant, binging a movie franchise, doing small lift house chores, creating a shopping mood board... anything else, BUT manual labor. I remember watching some DIY videos on Youtube & by the end of each video I would be simultaneously inspired & exhausted. Again I say, PASS. 

While I lot has changed in my life in the past five years - from renter to homeowner, to start - one thing that hasn’t changed is my aversion to manual labor. And to be clear, it’s not because I’m incapable. It’s because I’m unwilling. And with that, no desire to teach d.i.y. home improvement as a content creator. I commend anyone who makes a sound choice to put sweat equity into their home - to save money, because they enjoy it, etc. - however, I am just not that girl. I never want to set the expectation, as a creator, that it’s my job to sway you one way or the other. The choice to DIY in our home is almost always my husband’s and even that is with its limits. We’ve worked with some great tradesman as a result of hiring our services - and some not so great ones too admittedly - and have never looked back on a paid project feeling that we would’ve been better off doing it ourselves.

Do you DIY?

Are you like me and just can't be bothered, or are you part of this club of DIYers that's slowly taking over the world internet?