HGTV meets Women's Small Group

I honestly thought I might have to walk away from interior design... 

When I was in high school, I loved two subjects: Math & Art. In my sophomore year of high school, I sacrificed my study hall and took two math classes at the same time so that I could make it to Calculus (the hardest math class my high school offered at the time) my senior year. I also loved art. My high school art teacher is one of my favorite teachers that I ever had. She was wonderful and creative and a little bit weird. She suffered from short term memory loss, so things would regularly just disappear or get lost from the classroom. She allowed me to stow away “my” paint brushes, because she knew that I would always take good care of them. I loved creating collages, dying fabric, painting - all of it. 

In 2005, HGTV was blasting onto the scene - along with my favorite show: Trading Spaces. Do you remember it? Two sets of neighbors traded homes for a few days and made over one room in their neighbors’ home on a tight timeline and budget. Sometimes the transformations were beautiful and sometimes they… weren’t. HGTV opened my eyes to the world of design and I wanted in. I wanted to help people pick paint colors and pillows and transform the rooms in their homes. 

I went to college at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln to get my bachelors degree in Interior Design. The course load was rigorous and at one point, I almost gave up - but I stuck with it. 

In 2013, Rardon Design was born. My office was the guest bedroom in my husband and my two bedroom apartment. It was a humble and hustle beginning. His income covered our cost of living, so I was able to slowly grow my business that would ultimately give us the flexibility we craved to start a family. My first projects were helping my mom’s friends choose paint colors. A decade later, I was helping clients build million dollar homes from start to finish. If 2013 Rachel could see the projects I get to do now, she would cry tears of joy.

My favorite thing about interior design is the people. I love people. I love learning about the way that people live in their homes and the memories they dream of making. I love learning about the things - colors, materials, textures, and more - that people are drawn to… the things that make them smile. I love collaborating with contractors and electricians and plumbers and salespeople to create something beautiful. I love seeing a home come to life from what used to be a patch of dirt. 

Despite this love, I always felt a tension with interior design. My best friends are nurses actively saving people’s lives on the daily, walking with people through their hardest days - and I am helping pick paint colors. Interior design has long been a business that is reserved for the privileged. You aren’t able to hire an interior designer unless you have extra funds. I always knew that I was designing for the joy and the peace and the connection that happens in homes, but was that enough to negate the superficial side of it?

About a year ago, I decided that I wanted to create an online course. As a mom of three young kids, the idea of “passive income” is all the rage. Create something once and sell it over and over again. Instead of only being able to make an income when I am meeting with clients one on one - this could supplement my income by having something that I could create once and sell again and again. 

I started working with a Christian business mentor who specifically helped other Christian entrepreneurs create online courses. The first step was to decide what I would teach. 

At that point, I had 12 years of experience as an interior designer. I knew that whatever I was going to teach I needed to be ready to talk about it. All. The. Time. Because online courses don’t just sell themselves. On one of the first calls that I had with my mentor, I told her - I don’t know if I need to make a shift away from interior design, because in the deepest part of my soul I know that the most important thing for me to teach someone about their home is not how to pick a kitchen faucet. The most important thing is how we use our homes to love and serve the people around us. I believe our homes are a gift from God that we have the joy of stewarding for Him - to create places of rest, refuge, grace, love, peace, and joy!

She looked at me on that call and said, “Rachel, that is not a reason to walk away from design. That is your secret sauce. You need to teach THAT kind of design!” I wept. This was the first time I felt permission to talk about interior design and faith in the same conversation. 

So - FIRM Foundation was born. A course with four modules. A series of 10-minute teaching videos to learn concepts of faith and design, and worksheets to take action on these training sessions. F- Faith First, we set a mission statement for your home. We pray: “Lord, how would you like me to use my home to love and serve the people around me? How have you uniquely equipped and placed me to love your people?” I - Intentional Design, where we learn basic design principles. R - Roles, Rhythms, and Real Life, where we talk about the real life that our home needs to support. We look at the rhythms that we want our home to hold and promote. And M - Materials with Meaning, where we use everything we have learned and add design principles to make selections that bring everything together in a final design board for updating our homes. 

The original plan was that I would sell the course for $497. You would receive the course and 12 weeks of weekly group coaching calls. I launched the course with a few students and at about week ten, I realized that the group coaching calls were one of my favorite parts of the week. It was like women’s small group met HGTV, and the combination was good - it was encouraging and motivating and fun. And several of my clients were right in the middle of making big updates to their homes: remodeling a bathroom, updating every room of a fixer upper home, building a play house for grandkids, and more. And I didn’t want it to end. So… the membership was born. 

Now we have the FIRM Foundation membership. $47 per month. A much more accessible entry price, and ALL the same perks. The full course. All the training videos. All the worksheets. Weekly group coaching calls where you can ask your questions. An exclusive Facebook page where you can share updates and ask questions daily. It is genuinely one of my favorite places on the internet. This isn’t like scrolling Instagram and wishing your home could look like “that”. No comparison. No shame. This is where women are falling in love with their homes. Where they are shamelessly sharing their “before” photos, and working toward the “after”. Sharing ideas. And it’s so, so good. A group of women walking through the same challenges and cheering each other on. 

So that's the story about how I almost walked away from interior design... and yet, I stayed. I am excited about this “new” season of business. Still offering one-on-one interior design services, AND working with the coolest group of women on the internet who are falling in love with their homes again.

If you love Jesus and you’re ready to create a home that you love, rooted in Him - you should join our women’s small group - It’s called the FIRM Foundation membership, and it is so good. 

You can learn more HERE.

Love you, friend. Talk soon.