Designer Profile: Create Expectations
Dani caught up with style queens Kim and Leah Hallis from Create Expectations in our Melbourne showroom to have a candid chat about their success story and glean a few insider tips ...
Styling interiors since 1997, the team from Create Expectations partners with some of the most premium real estate agencies in Melbourne with a firm reputation for bringing spaces to life and adding significant value. Enjoying continued growth, Create Expectations has expanded its reach to partner with developers, investors and the design community.
Dani chats through the journey from a small retail shop to styling high end properties as Kim and Leah offer insider tips gleaned from over 25 years in the business ...
Dani: Today I'm joined by style queens Kim and Leah Hallis from Create Expectations and Create Interiors. When it comes to interior styling and property styling you are at the top of your game, servicing the high-end market, so we'd like to have a chat today about how you got there. Where did it all start Kim?
Kim: 'It started in a little shop in Laney Street in Melbourne ... I then had the opportunity to furnish an apartment for a developer friend, and it all snowballed from there.'
Dani: Giving us a peak into the world of multi-million-dollar properties, your clients want absolute luxury and a point of difference ... how do you go about sourcing product for that level of property?
Leah: We are highly focused on creating a really unique look. We don't want it looking like a stylist has been through, we want people to think 'have these people just got incredible style?’, ‘HAS it been styled?’ We achieve this by curating a mix of items with a bit of history alongside mainstream furniture, making the home feel really personal.
Dani: That would take a lot of organisation, so do you review everything before it goes out?
Leah: It used to be that way, but not anymore - now we have an incredible head of design, Matthew Dine who runs our team of six stylists...
Kim: They are so talented and so good, I'm completely confident and don't need to cast my eye over each job anymore.
Dani: Let's talk about deadlines, how do you manage them all and juggle all the balls?
Leah: I used to manage all the logistics, now we have a team of people managing this part of the business - staff, trucks, stylists, warehouse, accounts .... logistics are so massive at this level, we couldn't manage without our team ...
Kim: Sometimes we're doing 10-12 installs in a week, and they're big properties.
Dani: If you're going to get into the industry of property styling, you really need to understand the logistics and what goes on in the background. Is that the takeaway?
Kim: Yes, but one step back from that, you need to decide where you want to pitch yourself as a business ... if you want to do little flats with inexpensive furniture, then that should be where you pitch yourself. If you want to go a bit better than that, then you need to be prepared to make the investment in better quality furniture, and not just be able to deliver 1 or 2 to get your client on board, but be able to deliver 4, 5 or 6 properties at once.
Dani: That's good information to consider - the inventory you must have to have ... in your case probably six figures?
Kim: Yes, inventory is gigantic.
Leah: We're still buying constantly. The real estate market is so hot at the moment, you need to be able to look after your clients ... we're always updating and refreshing our inventory.
Dani: As a business, you also need to account for the ups and downs of the property market ...
Kim: There are definite cycles - they run around spring and summer, around school holidays, and any public holiday - no one wants a public holiday in their sales campaign...
Dani: What are some of the main logistic considerations when you are going in to style a property?
Kim: Access is one of the biggest .. things like the size of the doorway, angles like narrow hallways to get king beds into. We recently styled a 100 floor penthouse for a client - amazing building and quite fantastic, but the lift within the apartment was a tiny glass elevator and we had to reconsider what items we could use, for instance a modular sofa that could be transported in parts ...
We need to know things like the size of lift in apartment blocks, where the truck access is, you have to remember to contact body corporate to get permission, whether you need to reserve a spot for a truck to park. These things need to be considered otherwise you're bleeding money from your business when you're trying to solve these problems on the spot.
Dani: It must be so fantastic to see your clients reactions once you've reimagined their property, what does that feel like?
Leah: I love the comment 'OMG, I don't want to sell'. No-one lives the way we present, so when they walk back into their home and see it through fresh eyes ... done up to the 9's, fresh flowers, candles, mood lighting ... that emotional pull is incredible.
Dani: So when they go to buy their next property do you find they often come back to you?
Leah: Absolutely. Create Interiors is focused on looking after Create Expectations clients that have sold and want to recreate that look and feel. We do furniture, artwork and decor curation, but we also do finishings and fixtures schedules with architects, developers and builders.
Kim: Can I be brutely honest here?
On very rare occasions, we have a client that walks in and hates everything. For some reason, it's their personal taste ... so we then need to go through the process of trying to persuade them of what should stay and make a call on changing some things.
Leah: We need to talk about whether it's personal taste ... because if you put your property on the market, you're marketing it for the person who's buying it. You have to detach yourself from the property and think about the demographic, the buyer, the location, which agent is selling it, not just 'I don't like black cushions'...
Kim: Partial styling is so difficult
Leah: It's very invasive, and it can be quite confronting for people to come into your house and basically judge it and say 'these things have to go'. How we train our team is to communicate in a way that is respectful and informative, so that it's not an insult. Like 'we really need to think about the buyer, and we really need to think about who's coming into your home and get you a really great result.'
Dani: Absolutely great tips girls. Thank you so much for joining us today and for supporting our company ... it's been a long relationship and you do buy a lot of products from us ...
Kim: Oh, it has been a long relationship, and you do look after us beautifully, and when we have our urgencies, you do everything .... we really do appreciate it. Dani, today has been lovely, and the showroom looks amazing!
Leah: I spend a lot of time on the computer sourcing products, but you get such an incredible feel for the actual item when you can see it in the showroom - sit on it, touch it, feel it ... your products are such high quality as well.
Dani: Thanks girls, now lets pop open the bubbles ....
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