Can You Decorate
Without Overspending?

Wall Street analyst Beth Senko spends her days fearlessly dispensing advice to executives of giant corporations. But when it came time to decorate her Manhattan apartment, Ms. Senko faced someone truly daunting: her interior designer. She caved.

First, she spent $2,500 for a 1950s tea cart she'd never dreamed of owning. She bought a $4,500 Belgian-linen area rug and a $6,800 Florence Knoll sofa in ecru cotton velvet. The one item that had always been on her wish list -- a two-basin kitchen sink -- got an immediate thumbs down from her designer. He wants fur trim in the apartment. She doesn't. Her initial $125,000 budget is at $275,000 and counting.

Not that it's been a total rout. "I won on the shower head," she says.

Americans spent about $105 billion last year on home-decorating items, including furniture, carpets, comforters, clocks, lamps and art, according to U.S. Commerce Department figures. That's up 50% from a decade ago. And despite current economic uncertainty, more consumers setting up house are getting professional help. Some may feel they need professional help afterward -- being interior decorated, as Ms. Senko and others attest, can be brutal. Still, decorators were involved in about 20%, or at least $21 billion, of home-decor purchases last year, almost twice the level of a decade ago, according to industry estimates.

It's not just the high-end that's booming. Home Depot Inc., based in Atlanta, plans to staff 200 new stores with interior designers who will make home visits for a $750 retainer. An outfit in New York called Use-What-You-Have Interiors will do just that -- starting at $295 a room.

But does decorating on the cheap mean you'll wind up with furniture tackier than a game-show consolation prize? What can you expect from a top-dollar designer? And perhaps most importantly, how can homeowners empower themselves when decorators have their minds made up before they step through the door?

"The industry is filled with tyrannical, prima donna interior designers who intimidate their clients," says Sue Firestone, a decorator in Santa Barbara, Calif.

To help figure out the system, we hired interior designers at three price levels -- low, medium and high -- and asked each of them to create a new look for the same two-bedroom apartment. The 900-square-foot flat in Brooklyn, N.Y., has soaring ceilings and a fine hardwood floor, but the furnishings are a makeover-artist's dream, with mismatched Ikea bookcases and tea crates picked off the street.

We plucked a cheap designer out of New York magazine classifieds, we called department stores for midprice help, and we got our expensive designer by calling around to find one of New York's toniest. We told them all the same thing: We wanted the apartment to look more coherent. We said we liked traditional furniture, but nothing too ornate, and that we didn't like the contemporary look. We paid everyone their regular fees, but we didn't initially disclose our press credentials to the low- and middle-price designers; we wanted to see what typical consumers get for their dollar. We had to tell the high-price designer who we were from the outset because, well, he's a high-price designer and wouldn't show up otherwise. "I'll have to get his visa," his assistant told us, when informed that the project would be in Brooklyn.

Even the low end isn't cheap -- many months rent, in our case. One of the lower-price designers provided a free consultation and charged a $2,000 flat fee plus $250 a room for sketches, before buying even one lamp. For a midprice designer, we turned to the Bloomingdale's retail chain, which charges $750 for a retainer that would have been partially refundable had we rung up $10,000 in purchases. Some designers charge by the hour; fees generally range between $100 and $250.

In the end, we were happiest with the midrange experience. Neither the low-price decorator nor the most-expensive designer really listened to us, and both steered us to specific furniture lines. The Bloomingdale's designer bought items off the store's floor, but she did pay attention, mixing and matching a Victorian rattan armoire with a cherry-wood dresser we had snagged from a Washington flea market.

But almost all blew our budget, in some cases more than doubling it. If we were to do it again? We would low-ball our budget up front by at least 20% to give us some room to maneuver.

That said, some pricing schemes are more empowering than others: If you want to keep most of your possessions, watch out for commission-based consultants. They have an incentive to make you buy all new belongings. If you're willing to ditch your Grandmother Nell's dining table, go ahead and hire a designer who works on commission; designers can buy furniture at professional discounts of as much as 40% off retail prices, and typically pass at least half of the savings on to you. If you have no style backbone, find a designer whose portfolio you like -- because that's what you'll most likely get.

All in all, we felt the decorators were all a bit too ready to impose their taste upon us. "It's like you hire them to tell you what you like," says Washington legal recruiter Karen Pate, who used a designer from furniture retailer Ethan Allen last year. (The company says it doesn't charge for its designers, but expects them to select store merchandise.) When the designer asked her what she wanted, Mrs. Pate answered: globes. The designer responded: "No, you really don't," Mrs. Pate recalls. "I said, `No, I really do.'" How many globes fill her newly decorated home? None.

Here's how we did with each of our decorators:

Lower-Price Decorator

"This is great. I love it," says Carol Safier, stepping into the apartment. We should have stopped there.

Ms. Safier, of CS Interiors, New York, has stopped by for a 40-minute consultation -- something design experts recommend before signing up. Hers is free. We tell her we want to spend up to $10,000.

"Lighten up the room. It's too dark," she says from the living-room sofa. She eyes the wall that separates the living room from the smaller, second bedroom. "This is so stupid. Take the wall down. My guys could rip it up in 15 minutes." She spots the Ikea floor lamp. "Get rid of the lampshade," she snaps. "It's ugly."

Four dark-wood Ikea bookcases line one wall in the living room. "I don't know why these are here," she says. The lighting fixtures in the foyer must go: "A chandelier. It needs a chandelier." A paint job is indicated. "This white is awful," Ms. Safier says.

In the bedroom, two rough-hewn window frames that contain mirrors rather than glass hang over the bed. (We bought them at a neighborhood sale for $18, thinking how popular this look had become at retailers such as Pottery Barn.) "Enough already with the windows," Ms. Safier says.

"Some of the little knickknacks would have to go," she mutters, looking in the direction of the fireplace mantle, where a purple hippo Beanie Baby reclines. Above it rises a 5-foot-wide mirror that extends to the ceiling. "It looks awful. I'd frame the sides," she declares. Hmmm, that doesn't sound so attractive. "It'll look great," she vows. Ms. Safier spots something she likes. Finally. A dark-finished china cabinet picked up for $75 in Chicago. Whew, a winner.

The fee she quotes us -- $2,000 up front, no commission, "no hidden costs" -- places her at the lower end of the designer fee spectrum. Still, Ms. Safier drops addresses of ritzier clients: Manhattan's Trump Tower, where a family is spending half a million dollars; Central Park West. "You're going to have to buy a lot of stuff," she warns. For $10,000, "you'd have a palace," she predicts, as she trails off to field a call on her cell phone. "Your bathroom? It's beeeeautiful," she coos to a client.

No hidden costs, but we ring someone else, anyway: Steve Lyons, owner of No Big Deal Interior Decorating. His fee: $150 for a consultation and $50 an hour after that. "Lowest in the city," he says, promising a plan if we sign up. "It's not a floor plan. It's a plan of action."

Five days later, a half-hour late, Mr. Lyons, a 20-year-veteran, trudges up the stairs, a bulging black briefcase in hand, looking like the used-car salesman of interior design. "Let's talk," he says, stepping straight through the foyer into the living room, without comment. The previously stated fees aren't all he charges. For furniture purchases, we pay him the equivalent of half of the 40% discount he gets off retail prices. So for a $3,000 sofa, he gets a $1,200 discount and buys it for us for $1,800. We buy it from him for $2,400. "We share the discount," he explains, as we do the math and calculate that he makes a 30% commission on the deal.

He scans the room. What about the wall in the living room? "It ruins the original design," he says. "Do you use the extra room?" Uh, yes, we say, not knowing what the right answer would be. "Yes? Keep it then. It's practical." Relief floods us. Briefly. The sofa, bought at a suburban Chicago furniture store: "Ditch it." Arms too big. Dominates the room. Takes up the sitting space of at least one person. "An L-shaped couch. I'd recommend a sectional."

Then, it's all new stuff to buy: an easy-chair with an ottoman, an entertainment unit or armoire, a cocktail table, a dining table, an area rug. To the bedroom. "You want a new bed, an armoire with drawers and two bachelor-chest night stands. They have three drawers in them," he says. He eyes the bare wooden floors. "I'd like to wall-to-wall," he says.

We set a shopping date for the Design Center in midtown Manhattan, 16 floors of showrooms where only design professionals can buy -- at wholesale. "I don't do my trip," he says. "I do your trip." He trudges out with his $150 check.

Armed with a floorplan, Mr. Lyons takes his shopper to the Nicoletti showroom, where a saleswoman greets him happily, "Stevie!" Over about two hours, he coaxes and guides us to spend $21,152 -- almost twice our budget -- on a three-piece sectional couch covered in velvety fabric with leopard spots (or polka dots, depending on how closely we look), cocktail tables, an entertainment unit, a dining set, a bedroom set and a leather recliner. All of this while sitting at the dining table where he flips through catalogs, rising only occasionally to rhapsodize "Isn't this fabulous!" about something on the showroom floor.

For his efforts, Mr. Lyons would get his $400 in fees, plus another $4,000 in commissions that come from the $21,152 we would spend on furniture. We beg off buying on the spot. Good thing: We were swept away by his enthusiasm, but a week later, we realize leopard skin and leather just aren't us.

Midprice Designer

You can't get any more mainstream than Macy's or Bloomingdale's, both units of Federated Department Stores Inc. Macy's has a cheaper $250 retainer, which gets deducted from the bill when you buy $1,500 in furniture, but their designers don't do home visits and just work from photos and floor plans. At Bloomie's, it's a $750 retainer, of which $500 is refundable after $10,000 in purchases.

Taking notes, congenial interior designer Carla Bloom Katzen peppers us with questions as she guides us through Bloomingdale's furniture department. "What do you think of metals? Rattan?" Our budget: $15,000, but we might go higher. "I live vicariously through other people's lives," Ms. Katzen pronounces.

She discovers for us that we like rattan. She also gets us excited about the Tradewinds line designed by the retired head of her department. A $3,700 refectory gaming table with leaves to seat eight is perfect for New York apartments, she declares. She guides us to a leather arm chair. "Like it?" Actually, yes. She lifts the $1,465 price tag and says, "Believe me, I wouldn't let you buy anything for full price. We'd get it on sale." Later, she'll get the dining table down to $2,960 on sale. Ms. Katzen doesn't get paid by commission but rather by salary, though bonuses are pegged to how much business she rings up.

It's like the "Price Is Right" without Bob Barker. Ms. Katzen recommends a $1,200 wooden armchair, although it doesn't look that comfy. Skip one Ralph Lauren bedroom set. "It's dark, clubby. It's a look," she advises, leading us to a massive bed frame that will do great for $3,500, even though we'd prefer a bed with a canopy. She summons us to look at a sleeper sofa priced at $1,865. "Really, it's great!" she says. An hour later, we've got just about everything we need. The folder Ms. Katzen gave us at the outset includes something special: a credit-card application.

Armed with a 25-foot measuring tape, Ms. Katzen diligently arrives the next day to measure the apartment: "If somebody says, 'I don't do measurements,' don't listen to them." She is merciful. The china cabinet: "It's good for now." The bookcases: "They're harmless." The window-pane mirrors: "We can use them for something" -- take that, Cheap Decorator No. 1. That vexatious living room wall? "We can keep it if you want." We decide guests will be happier even if Cheap Decorator No. 1 isn't. We keep it.

Ms. Katzen won't even discuss the details of the new apartment she envisions until she presents her design, eight days later. With a bundle of swatches and a floor plan, she says she prefers now to tear down the wall. Her scheme is gorgeous for $37,898.75 -- more than double my initial budget. It doesn't include a silver-framed double dresser mirror she hasn't yet found, not to mention the dreamy canopy she plans to have her window treatment man create for the Tradewinds queen four-poster bed. Yeah, she listened, about the style if not the costs. But on second thought, looking over the estimate, do we really want the $106.50-per-yard zebra fabric for the black-painted wooden armchair?

High-Brow Designer

Prospective clients ask interior designer John Saladino's assistant, Jane Seamon, whether he is scary. She assures them he isn't. Oh, but he is. A 30-year-veteran, he runs a sprawling design shop on the top floor of the Design Center, and cuts an imposing fire-hydrant-like figure. Designer to the superrich, Mr. Saladino, 59, sits at the conference table where clients come to interview him. But really, he says, "I interview them." It costs $35,000 just to get a design plan. Then the firm bills by the hour for shopping, installing, remodeling. Mr. Saladino's time goes for $500 an hour, the rate we pay him for two hours of consultation.

He's picky about clients. One profession he bars: trial attorneys. "They're not visual. They're insecure in this field." So there. He recoils if called a decorator. "Women in between marriages become decorators." He prefers to be called a designer. The biggest problem with the profession: "Women will buy a Judith Lieber handbag for $6,000 and never discuss it with their husband. But they have to discuss a $6,000 sofa with their husband, and they have to sleep on it. They have to show it to their friends. The sofa has to go to the grave with you."

The son of a Kansas City doctor, he remembers every detail of the childhood home he helped decorate at 16. When he enters our humble abode, he is kind -- at first: "It's gracious." But then, in the foyer: "You set the tone with the entrance. The lighting here is ghastly. Get rid of the fixture." The replacement: a chandelier lantern. Win one for Cheap Decorator No. 1.

Out go the French curio tables that display the childhood bangles and Presidential Physical Fitness Award. "They're Bombay Company," he scoffs, a dig at the midprice retailer. He prefers another furniture line: his own. Picking only items from the Saladino line, he suggests a pair of $1,746 "Tube Floor Lamps" on both ends of new bookcases that would replace the Ikea stalwarts. Next to the book cases, two "Sleigh Chairs" for $1,500 each.

In the bedroom, he dictates a French white-on-white carpet. "Almost wall-to-wall with a foot on the sides." Score one for Cheap Decorator No. 2. He calls for a fruitwood sleigh bed facing the opposite way everyone else pointed the bed. And he sees more colors, more clearly. "Let's say we did the bed in different shades of pink, red and fuschia. You'll match well with it." Thanks. We think.

Stepping into the living room, his reaction is instant: "Tear down this wall." It "absolutely violates the integrity of the room. It's ghastly. The original intent of the architect has been ruined." Ms. Cheap Decorator No. 1, also a wall-basher, scores major points. The room, he says, was meant to be a 19th-century parlor. To restore the octagon shape he wants to put two cupboards in two corners. Inside, "you have to buy beautiful porcelains for $700 each." The mirror above the mantle "is a poor attempt to open up the room." "It's Joan Crawford 1954," he says. It's far too frightening to even contemplate asking what he means.

The current dining table with its carved legs goes, but "the dining zone" stays where it is, with its view of a church. The table must be replaced with the "Balustrade Dining Table," for about $5,000 draped to the floor in fabric. We take solace in knowing that at least we picked an acceptable "dining zone."

By now, we're a little insecure about our white walls. That's confirmed. "A real pale pink," he says dreamily. The sofa: "It's ugly," he says, not that we really care anymore. Much. It would be replaced with "the Landau Sofa," about $8,000 for a custom-made velvet piece with a sleeper sofa (now that the guest room is gone). "In the winter, I'm going to do this in a deep duck-pond linen velvet," he says, looking into space. "In the summer, the slipcover would be a pale pink cotton." Oh, the sofa ottoman gets to stay, disguised with a slipcover.

Mr. Saladino accepts something else. The Ikea floor lamp. "I can use the lamp -- with a new shade." We can almost hear the echo of Ms. Cheap Decorator No. 1. A final dagger comes when he spots the china cabinet, accepted by even Middle-of-the-Road Bloomie's Designer. "Out!" he declares. "It reminds me of a struggling family where the poor wife kept the few pieces of porcelain that she used once a year." And we've only got one paltry piece of terra cotta in there.

The price tag for this extravaganza: about $65,000, just for the furnishings. That's $72 a square foot -- or about double the cost of renting space at the Empire State Building. Tack on his designer fee and hourly rates, and the total soars into six figures.

Mr. Saladino must be feeling a little guilty. On the window sill in the little room with no integrity, he eyes seashells saved from beach vacations. We forgot to hide them. "I like the seashells," he declares. And two lively accessories, eclectic and playful, get to stay: Billie and Billuh, the apartment's cats. "Puddy cat, puddy cat," he mews to Billie, sitting on the rejected dining table, next to the rejected sofa, next to the rejected bookcases, next to the integrity-violating walls. "I like you."

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