SAHMs Redesign Their Lives

Washington Post Magazine:

Ashburn resident Suzan Meredith was drawn to interior decorating. She had been sewing since she was a child growing up in Michigan and Utah, had an affinity for fabric and an eye for design, and had helped plenty of friends decorate their homes.

When her younger daughter headed off to elementary school, Suzan, now 47, wanted to turn her passion into a viable career and a second income for her family. Appreciating the entrepreneurial sensibility of her husband, Todd, who co-owns a political consulting firm, she also wanted to have her own business. But the stay-at-home mother of two, a former meeting planner, says she didn’t have the confidence to start a decorating venture without any formal training or certification, especially in the hypercompetitive, hypercredentialed Washington region.

Suzan spent one week and $3,500 on an “intense” course in New York in 2005 led by Lauri Ward, who founded the IRN in the early 1980s. Meanwhile, friend and fellow Ashburn resident Jennifer Mangum, a stay-at-home mom of four who had majored in accounting in college but also had the design bug, took the interior refiner course at home on CD, which costs $2,500.

With certifications in hand, Suzan and Jennifer, now 37, teamed up to found Redecorate Today last year. “What’s really great about our business [is] we go with two sets of eyes and two sets of arms,” Suzan says. The partners set up a Web site and made the rounds of local furniture and accessory stores, dropping off their business cards. “Our first client was a lady who got our card from the rug store and called us out of the blue,” Suzan recalls.

The team does everything from color consultations to shopping. Prices to refine rooms are determined by size and range from $125 for a bathroom to $650 for a room up to 30 feet long.