Why I Am Resigning from “Interior Design”

Words matter. Titles carry weight.

For decades, I have operated under the banner of “Interior Designer”—a title I earned through rigorous training, structural execution, and years of corporate and independent practice. But effective today, I am formally relinquishing that title.

Not because I am leaving the built environment, but because I am choosing to step out of a broken container.

The Catalyst: Poking the Bear

Recently, I posted a simple yet profound carousel on Instagram addressing the systemic issues, the lack of standards, and the intellectual dilution within our field. I wrote it as an invitation to look deeper. Instead, it ruffled feathers. It “poked the bear.”

What followed was a masterclass in defensive fragility. The message was completely taken out of context, twisted, and misunderstood—mostly by those who found themselves living in the very reality I was calling out. There is an old, visceral truth that a hit dog will holler. When you shine a light on the structural cracks of an industry, those who have built their entire professional identity on those fragile cracks will always hear an attack instead of an invitation to rise.

It baffled me—and yet, in a way, it didn’t—how completely the point was missed. Even people I once deeply respected in this industry revealed themselves, displaying a profound misunderstanding and choosing to take personal offense over a title.

At the same time, the post acted as a quiet homing beacon. While some were yelling, others—those who walk in my exact shoes, who understand the physical and psychological gravity of this work—reached out in absolute, silent alignment. The room cleared itself. The noise separated from the substance.

The Dilution of a Profession

The truth remains: the professional title of “Interior Designer” is fundamentally broken.

It is a title without strict, formal, and universal regulation across the board. When an industry lacks structural consistency, the title itself becomes a hollow catch-all. It collapses the multi-disciplinary, highly technical, and deeply psychological work of space planning and spatial behavior into a superficial aesthetic game.

I am no longer willing to lend my decades of expertise, my education, and my energy to a title that has been systematically cheapened. I have never been interested in superficial decoration, and I am no longer interested in trying to correct an industry that is comfortable with its own ignorance.

Dropping this title isn’t a defensive wall built out of hurt; it is a boundary built out of sovereignty. It frees me from having to fix a broken system. I don’t have to save the interior design industry. I just get to step out of it and be happy in my own fortress.

The New Era: Spatial Anthropology

Until there is formal, strict, and legally binding regulation that protects the technical, ethical, and intellectual boundaries of design, I will operate entirely in a lane of my own creation.

I am not an Interior Designer.

I am a Principal Designer + Spatial Anthropologist.

My work is, and has always been, about the somatic, psychological, and cultural architecture of how human beings inhabit space. I decode the unspoken rituals, the cultural heritage, and the psychological safety of the environments we build. 

This is a practice defined by depth, legacy, and absolute truth.

The old title served its season. But the foundation I am building next requires a much stronger, much more honest language.

I am moving forward. I leave the rest to their noise.

Thanks for being here!

Twelve15 Design Studio