Last month we were engaged by the Principal of Merri Creek Primary School in Melbourne’s Fitzroy North (and also coincidentally our next door neighbour here at the studio!) Lynne Kemp to completely redesign the interior of her (very) dated, cave-like office.

The brief for this office design and refurbishment project was simple – ‘modern country with splashes of red’.  The budget was about $5K, including purchasing and delivery of all the furniture and other items comprising the new fit-out, so we had to be both resourceful and creative with planning and design.

Before the Office Design and Refurbishment:

 

Before photos of interior of Principal's Office and Desk prior to office design and refurbishment | Jen Clark Design  Before photos of meeting area in interior of Principal's Office prior to office design and refurbishment | Jen Clark Design

With just over a month to complete the office design and refurbishment project, and with the Xmas and New Year holidays looming, we had a challenge on our hands! But after a couple of days of moodboard creation (made so much easier courtesy of the fantastically simple Niice moodboard tool), product research, assembly of a simple floor plan, a lot of phone calls to suppliers and sign off from Lynne – we had a plan in place and everything ordered. All we needed then was for the interior of the office to be cleared and re-painted in gloriously fresh white, and we could lock in an install date for the fit-out, which ended up being last Friday, 23 January.

After the Office Design and Refurbishment:

 

Interior of Principal's Office after office design and refurbishment | Jen Clark Design Couch and small table in Interior of Principal's Office after office design and refurbishment | Jen Clark Design

Because of the limited budget, unfortunately we weren’t able to purchase some of the ‘nice to have’ decorative extras such as contemporary artwork, a rug, a clock, mirror, coat stand, etc, but we did manage to well and truly cover all of Lynne’s basic functional needs, giving her a bright, fresh new office with a very homely, warm and welcoming vibe. Just goes to show you don’t need to spend an absolute fortune to achieve a really effective result.

Suppliers included IKEA, Officeworks, Swan Street Sales, 2nd Chance Tables, Fitzroy Nursery, Rapee and Beacon Lighting.

Absolutely adored doing this small-scale interior design project! The smile on Lynne’s face upon seeing her new-look office fit-out was priceless.