Not proud, not yet. Grateful.

Not proud, not yet. Grateful.

One year ago, I started writing about other people’s rooms.

I thought I knew what it would be.

Interviews, materials, a few good headlines..!

I didn’t know it would turn into 100 articles.

I didn’t know four designers would trust a brand this young enough to collaborate with us, for free, before we had anything to show for it.

And I definitely didn’t know how much of the work would be learning to say what I actually think.

Here’s the honest version of year one.

100 articles published..!

4 designer collaborations…!

0 paying customers…

That last number is the one most people would leave out.

I’m leaving it in.

Because it’s true, and because I’ve spent a year writing about the difference between a room that looks good and a room that works.

A highlight reel is a room that looks good.

This is the other kind.

What I’ve learned is smaller than I expected.

Technical drawing is not a formality.

It’s the part of design education that gets skipped, and it’s the part everything else stands on.

If you can draw a section accurately, you can catch a problem before it’s built.

If you can’t, you depend on someone else to check your work for you, indefinitely.

That belief is the reason I’m running workshops..

It’s the reason this whole thing exists.

The goal for the rest of the year is five of them, delivered.

Not a number I can promise yet.

A number I’m working toward, in public, one drawing at a time.

So here’s what I feel, and I’ve thought about the word.

Not proud.

Not yet.

Grateful.

For the people who read the first article when nobody was reading anything.

For the designers who said yes.

For every student who sent me a question I hadn’t thought to ask.

Year one was about building a room.

Year two is about finding out who walks in.

Thank you for standing in it with me…!!