British Academy of Interior Design

[Seasaltlady]

I am looking to make a career change and having always been very keen on interiors, would like to spend the next few years studying design. My children are both in primary school and I have taken some time out from a senior role in Pharma to look after them full time. I have so far looked at the British Academy of Interior Design, specifically their Higher National Diploma as it allows home study and could possibly be seen by potential interior design firms as an adequate level of interiors education for me to join them at entry level. I have seen some old threads but nothing very recent! Any insight would be gratefully appreciated before I sign up! Thank you!

Hello,
I am an interior designer. I changed careers into it in my mid 20s and did an additional interior design qualification to access it. My advice would be to have a good think about if this is really what you want to do , or if you just feel there is a creative itch you want to scratch. Interior design is very poorly paid (I have worked for top studios, and now client side) and it is long hours and for not a lot of reward. If I could tell my younger self to retrain in something lucrative I would! In my opinion interior design courses are a waste of money…. unless you can truly afford to do so. There are courses at Inchbald and KLC which are very expensive, and in my experience attract the type of student for whom money is no object. I would think long and hard, and if still interested, try dipping your toe in with an introductory or shorter term course to validate it really is what you hope it will be. In my experience, coming into the field from any kind of corporate or professional career path is a huge plus, as you will already have a lot of transferable skills, be organised and I imagine a strong work ethic, which are really the two most important things we look for in junior designers. Lots of things like suppliers and design thinking can be taught on the job.
Hope that helps!