Seems straightforward enough.  I can imagine lots of high school students or 2nd career seekers asking this question.

Of course there are lots of legitimate resources available to those who are curious, books (those things in “libraries” and “book stores”), guidance counselors, friends of friends, etc. But PROFESSIONALINTERIORDESIGNER is fairly certain that the world wide intrawebanet is your #1 go-to resource for this query.

So if you Google that question you will be bombarded with 3.6 million options. HOW THE HELL CAN THERE BE 3 MILLION WAYS TO BECOME AN “INTERIOR DESIGNER”?  I digress.

For reference the general query “How do you become an Architect” results in 15+ million hits…but who’s counting?

Visiting and reading all of those sites just overwhelmed me. I made it through 2.2 million but had to take a bathroom break.  So being the hardcore scholarly researcher that I am I went to YouTube to watch a video on how to become an Interior Designer.   Let’s face it, that is most likely how all prospective Interior Designers seek out answers to this question. So my next level of investigation was to see which videos had the most hits.  Because is that not the true test of a video’s legitimacy?  Sorting by viewer count this is the winner with 176,811 views in just under 4 years;

Just to break it down that is nearly 44,000 views per each of 4 years this video has been online.  Kudos to Ms. Robeson.  If you care about such things she has created quite a on-line presence with her decorating posing as design DIY videos.  My point here is not to impugn Ms. Robeson.  Her entrepenuerial skills are quite admirable.

It is clear that Ms. Robeson caters to the innately qualified who wish to claim the title ‘Interior Designer” without consideration for such pesky things like….oh…an education, or an apprenticeship, earning credentials via an examination (of any type) or committing to ethical practice by membership in any one of our many professional organizations.  But that is her right.  She can do that and she does it well.  But 44,000 views per year?  Back to my point.

For those of us who claim the title “Interior Designer” by earning a degree, working as an apprentice, studying our butts off for any number of professional competency examinations and paying copious amounts of dues monies to our professional organizations I wonder how our effort to define that path to the title “Interior Designer” compares.  How do our “How To” videos rate on the viewership scale?  After all do we not want our pathway to status as an “Interior Designer” to be equally recognized?

That is somewhat of rhetorical question because the domain of “Interior Designer” is so broad-much to our chagrin.  Just because we say it is one thing, that does not mean that the public perception of “Interior Design” matches our particular definition http://www.ncidqexam.org/about-interior-design/definition-of-interior-design/.  Try as we might to make “Interior Design” match the above definition PROFESSIONALINTERIORDESIGNER maintains (see previous 300+ posts) that we have lost that battle.  But let’s not get too off topic here.  The focus here is how those who seek a career in Interior Design actually find their way through the labyrinth of potential pathways.

So if go to YouTube and type in “How do I become  an Interior Designer?” you will note that not one video represents what we professional interior designers might consider legitimate or professional.  Most are independent DIY’s or for profit schills..ooops sorry I meant “schools”, all trying to persuade the inquisitive to their website.  Actually one of the most informative and relevant videos that tries to answer the basic query was created by an Interior Design student;

Kudos to Ms. Paterson.  She has 26,000 + hits in one year.  Wow.

Makes me wonder why, with all of our resources, that the profession as represented by  ASID, IIDA, IDEC, CIDA, NCIDQ, IDC, CCIDC, IDEX, cannot create a video resource that will help direct the inquisitive down the path to professional status as a “Interior Designer?”.

You know one that matches the Interior Design we proclaim to practice.

Maybe we could pool our marketing budgets and hire Ms. Paterson.

P.S. 8/5/16- Hmmmm.  Here is an answer from Ireland for what it’s worth;  http://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/homes-and-property/how-to-become-an-interior-designer-1.2745009

P.S. 11/18/16 Here is how to do it in 4 SIMPLE STEPS….http://careerswiki.com/how-to-become-an-interior-designer/#prettyPhoto 

P.S. 11/30/16 Can’t argue with these tips…http://freshome.com/2014/10/13/10-things-you-should-know-about-becoming-an-interior-designer/