For as long as I can remember I have had a love for creativity, organization and beautiful spaces.
As a teenager I always enjoyed rearranging items in our home and always noticed details in other homes. My creativity as a child was limited to knitting, sewing, singing and nail painting as this was what I had access to. I also had a love for numbers, a great memory for dates, which surfaced in my career choice as a chemist and is now helping me with my interior design work.
My serious design projects started around 15 years ago, these were unpaid but fun! At some point I realized that design work was what I really wanted to be doing and made the decision to start my own interior design company, Argan Design.
In 1996, my husband and I purchased our first home in Roseville, CA. I still remember my excitement of decorating all the rooms! At this time I had not educated myself on interior design, yet I knew that the rooms in my home needed to be organized and decorated nicely!
These were really my earliest projects. These projects ranged from selecting color schemes to themes, not the interior design styles that I’m now aware of. I decorated rooms with themes such as Indian, African, Hawaiian, Sports, and simply surrounded myself with colors and objects that I loved.
Around 2007 we decided to find a slightly larger home. I must have seen every model and for sale home in the area, particularly in Sacramento, Roseville, Rocklin, Lincoln, and El Dorado Hills. It was during this time that I truly became addicted to interior design and started subscribing to magazines such as Architectural Digest. It was during reading one of these design magazines that I started considering building our next home rather than purchasing an existing home. We started looking for land and purchased one in Roseville.
During my search for an architect, I came across an article that detailed how to create your own floorplan, own space planning, and how to create your own custom home plan. I slept on this idea and started the floor plan for my home the next morning! The home’s design evolved over the next three years as I educated myself through many channels of interior design. Around this time I started educating myself of all the different interior design styles available to me and the awareness that the interior design and landscape design should complement each other. Soon I was educating myself on all facets of home design, from the interior to the landscape.
As I worked on my house plan, I consulted with architects, interior designers, landscape designers and decorators in Roseville. Although I needed their expertise for their own fields I started realizing that their ideas were not as unique and bold as my taste! As with the interior design, I started realizing that if I really wanted something unique it will be difficult to find unless I researched and designed the entire home myself! Designing my own home from the ground up served as the basis to launch my interior design career. I created unique interior designs for each individual room in my home which led to me designing the closets and cabinets (including kitchen) in each room too.
The closet designers in the local Roseville area that I consulted were also mainly giving me monotonous designs and were more focused on selling than creativity. Although I understand the selling process, I feel it is very important to first spend time in researching, planning, and creating.
At Argan Design we really want to make our clients happy. I want them to have unique looking custom spaces and designs once finished.
One of my earlier projects was the design of a dental clinic in Santa Rosa, CA. I really enjoyed this as it was my first commercial project. The interior design and space planning of this office had to be very efficient and appeal to the clinic’s patients. These factors led to me my choice of the contemporary style and natural colors. I wanted the office to feel very calm but also have some color to create a happy vibe. This led to the use of a neutral base with lots of turquoise accents, which included the dental chairs, lighting and painted ceilings. Finishes in the office were kept simple.
I enjoy all of my projects, but another favorite was the remodel of a kitchen in Granite Bay, CA of an older traditional home. This was my first remodel project, and my focus was for the kitchen to blend in with the rest of the house. The original kitchen was very dark with dark green cabinets and with very little natural light. We started by removing a wall that separated the kitchen from the living room, which instantly gave the kitchen a more open feel. A window over the kitchen sink was expanded to help bring in additional light. The original traditionally carved cabinets were retained but were sanded and painted in a light cream color. All of the finishes including lighting, cabinet knobs, flooring were updated but were kept traditional to help the kitchen blend in with the rest of the home.
Another fun client project involved a monochromatic bedroom design in Roseville for a bachelor. This one I designed with no color, only lots of variations in the same color tones. The bedroom gives you a reminder of sand and dunes. The emphasis with this design was on including an abundance of textures.
I really enjoy working with my clients and love seeing them smile after their finished project. For me this is really a labor of love and what I enjoy doing the most. I look forward to exciting and challenging projects be it in interior design, landscape design or any other design service that I offer such as helping you shop for your finishes! Contact us.
