Fall 2020 One Room Challenge x High Point Market: Week 6

week 1 | week 2 | week 3 | week 4 | week 5 | week 6

Has it been 6 weeks already? I guess if the calendar says it, then it must be so!

Which means we’re at the end of the first ever virtual edition of the One Room Challenge, sponsored by High Point Market.

Admittedly I had all kinds of conflicting, weird feelings around this season — excitement for being chosen as a featured designer, fomo watching all the guest participants actually do things, confusion figuring out how to make the virtual design as real as possible… just so many feelings. And God in His in infinite divine timing put it in our path to buy our first home right when working on this project. So what started as “imaginary” quickly became very real and very personal. But let’s go back to the beginning…

After being part of IMC High Point Makes virtual show house, The Home That Diversity Built, I was inspired to create the interior counterpart to my exterior design. It wasn’t long till I decided that this project, along with my Pinterest board, would be the digital manifestation of my future (now present) home. That took the design ideas through many phases and iterations…

While secretly plotting on our home, I wanted to see how far I could push this design but sourcing for the other two spaces I had in mind — the laundry room and the half bath — proved to be a bit more challenging than time permitted (even virtual) because of the sheer volume of vendors to consider from High Point Market. And knowing that I’d previously created the outdoor space, I brought it back full circle and focused on what would be the media room and garden study.

IMC/HPMKT "The House that Diversity Built"

Design by Albie Knows | Illustration by Nicole Updegraff

IMC/HPMKT "The House that Diversity Built"

Design by Albie Knows | Illustration by Nicole Updegraff

Dining Area

Seating Area

Just with my IMC/HPMKT design, I knew that while I could reasonable bring my design to virtual life, it would be better to get expert help outside of myself. If you read my previous updates, then you know I had the please of partnering with Duke Renders for the final iteration of my design.

It’s one thing to have an idea in your head.

It’s something else to see it as a mood board & space plan.

But it’s an absolute GAME CHANGER to have someone make you’re design as close to real as real can get without actually executing & installing the design.

Fabiana on the Duke Renders team took my raw design, before images, and product links and turned them into something that I am so proud up. I was legit speechless y’all. Because here’s the thing — I know how to do renderings, but it’s not exactly my “zone of genius” and that’s in large part because it involves switching back and forth from designer to renderer. Being able to step away and hand off the rendering allowed me to see the design with fresh eyes and appreciate my design choices so much more.

Specifying from Market vendors afforded me custom options, as it related to many of my finishes, pairing them with Sherwin Williams paints colors for a robust design. This, however, makes seeing how it’ll turn out just a tad more difficult than shopping retail or even ready to ship options. And while this is based on a real space, I didn’t get to do any real furniture blocking to assess the accuracy of the scale. Coupled with just being plain ol tired… I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about my design being any good.

Fabiana sent me my “clay" renders” first, which are essentially first drafts of the final design — no textures or finishes, just the “raw” design…

These renders gave me a chance to reconsider placement, scale, and high touch design choices. Then came the full preview — with color & texture — where additional tweaks were made… bringing us to present day…

Media Room

Design by Albie Knows | Render by Duke Renders

Media Room

Design by Albie Knows | Render by Duke Renders

Garden Study

Design by Albie Knows | Render by Duke Renders

Media Room

Garden Study

Even before knowing that a home I’d be purchasing would be the foundation for this design, I knew I wanted it to feel as real, as accessible, and as aspirational as possible, be it for me to actually create later or for you to draw inspiration from. While nearly everything is considered trade only, not all are custom — there are vendors that have ready to ship items, barring any COVID related delays. With so many vendors at my disposal, as with my IMC outdoor design, I chose vendors that I knew I could easily shop, and therefore you can easily. shop… “easily” being relative.

So what’s next?

My home’s floor plan being the basis for this design coupled with the Duke Renders team bringing it to life has given me full confidence to pursue this design in real life… in addition to the rest of the “must be nice” spaces…

If you remember from some updates ago, what would be my media room is flanked by a laundry room and half bath. While these two spaces weren’t rendered as part of this reveal, seeing how the contrast of the two larger, more dominant spaces came out exactly how I’d imagined… yeah, I’m really excited to tackle this for real for real.