Nina Magon entered the interior design industry with an instinct for the business side of things—whether it was employing her design school professors to pitch in on projects for her just-launched firm, or later using her rooky status on a design TV show to scale up her portfolio. As her firm enters the next phase, she’s focused on finding ways to shape up her team and her business’s back-end to provide the ideal luxury experience to clients.

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Nina Magon
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

Erin Gates has a special talent for identifying untapped potential: She started her own firm geared toward young professionals in Boston in 2007, finding great success among an underserved clientele; she was also an early design blogger, part of a shift that would transform the design industry (and send her own career skyrocketing). In this episode, the Wellesley, Massachusetts–based designer explains how she stayed authentic amid pressure to bend, how she finds team members that support her vision, and why she’s so excited about the new hire keeping her firm’s operations in check. 

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Erin Gates
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

Rachel Halvorson started her firm in the wake of the recession, and found sudden success with celebrity clients and magazine covers all in the first years of her business. As she’d come to find out, establishing boundaries would be the only way to keep her fast-growing project pipeline from spilling over into all-out chaos.

This episode is sponsored by Daniel House Club.

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Rachel Halvorson
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

Delia Kenza rose quickly through the world of design when a chance encounter landed her home in the pages of a magazine. While her business benefited from the structure of design platform Homepolish in its early years, going out on her own would mean establishing systems to help her firm keep up with the rising popularity—and making sure those same processes would anchor her firm for the long haul.

This episode is sponsored by Daniel House Club.

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Delia Kenza
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

When Meg Lonergan embarked on her design career, it seemed that her biggest hurdle was demonstrating to the rest of the design industry that despite her nontraditional education and early career experiences, she was just as talented and qualified as any other successful firm owner. Then, a near-total firm meltdown during the pandemic led her to a stunning realization: The biggest obstacle standing in the way of her firm’s growth was herself. 

This episode is sponsored by Daniel House Club and The Shade Store

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Meg Lonergan
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

After launching Foley & Cox in 2002, Michael Cox and his partner Mary Foley led the business through every high and low the industry had in store—including a recession, periods of rapid growth and multiple generations of clients—and refined their processes bit by bit with each new challenge and achievement. Now, the firm has fixed its focus on an even greater goal: finding new ways to nurture the next generation of design talent.

This episode is sponsored by Daniel House Club and The Shade Store

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Foley & Cox
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

Shaun Crha’s career kicked off with a steady rise into the high-stakes world of banking. When the stress of the job nearly pushed him to a breaking point in his health, however, he decided to instead pursue a calling that aligned more closely with his values, and soon combined his business acumen with a long-overlooked creative spark to start his own design business. Just when the firm hit its peak, however, a family emergency brought everything crashing down around Crha once again. It was then that the designer reached another realization: It was time to rethink everything, starting with the inner workings of his business. 

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Sean Crha
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

This episode was sponsored by Atlanta Market and Currey & Company.

Lucy O’Brien has never been afraid to go after what she wants—before she’d even booked her first clients, she showed up to High Point Market entirely on her own to learn from the industry’s best before embarking on a career in design. Which is why, during the first few years of her firm’s existence, she decided to transform her business’s operations with the goal of only taking on ideal clients and projects. In this conversation, she shares why she’s so straightforward with clients about her cost structure, the test she uses to identify her employees’ instincts, and why she’s looking for inspiration outside of social media. 

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Lucy O'Brien
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

This episode was sponsored by Atlanta Market and Currey & Company.

Amy Sklar’s early career was a full-circle journey that took her from design to show business and back again. When she finally landed at the helm of her own firm after starting her career within the strict confines of an architecture firm, she thrived on the ability to instate a supportive work culture and take on projects that place a premium on comfort and functionality. The financial side of things, however, didn’t come quite as easily. In this conversation, she shares the pivot that pushed her to finally bring in revenue, how deliverables define each step of her firm’s process, and why she wants employees to feel like they work with her, not for her.  

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Amy Sklar
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

This episode was sponsored by Universal Furniture and Gabby.

Like many designers, Ashley Ross left a successful corporate career in order to pursue her dreams of design—a history she’s shared with her dedicated online following. What those followers didn’t know, however, is that her previous chapter didn’t end as early as she’d initially let on. In this conversation, she explains why staying aligned with her original commitment to authenticity meant dismantling the idea of what an ideal design career should look like.

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Ashley Ross
Kaitlin Petersen
Business of Home

This episode was sponsored by Universal Furniture and Currey & Company.