If you are wondering what’s the average interior designer’s salary you’ve came to the right place. In my YouTube video I talk about the different interior designer salaries mostly in London, UK and New York. Similarly, I discuss; junior, mid-weight and senior interior designer salaries as well as those of the design directors. The interior design industry can be a great career and it’s worth knowing how much you can earn as an employee. If you want to learn more about the career paths – check out this post on Interior Design Career.
Junior Interior Designer’s Salary
So, let’s start with junior interior designer’s salary – entry level positions in the interior design industry. The junior interior designer’s salary in London, UK is between £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] a year.
In America, it’s somewhere between $[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] per year.
These salaries are relative to the size and prestige of the company and not forgetting, your own portfolio.
Junior Designer’s Tasks
The junior designer’s tasks for entry level interior design jobs are simple or less complicated, to help you learn the first steps in the industry. For example, they may ask you to:
- order samples for the studio (fabric, timber, stone, metal etc.)
- organise meetings with the potential suppliers
It’s all about assisting the more senior members of the team with preparing presentations and technical drawings. IF you’re skilled with AutoCad or Revit, you might be drawing CAD blocks or simple plans.
Mid-weight Interior Designer’s Salary
The lowest mid weight interior designer’s salary would be around £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] a year. The medium one will be around £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] and the higher paid mid-weight interior designers can earn up to £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] a year.
Likewise in the U.S. the salary for the midwinter designer will be starting from $[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] to $[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] a year.
This mainly depends on your experience, skills and also to a certain extent – the size of your company.
How to Earn More
There is a trick to earning more as a mid-weight interior designer, especially in the UK. Basically you need to find one special skill that few (if any) colleagues have (it’s kind of like your superpower). This helps really increase your salary.
For example: if your hand sketching is of a high standard and makes all the presentations look better, you are onto something. Similarly, you can make great photoshopped finishes boards which sell the project well.
This is actually how I increased my annual salary by £10 000 in just one year of my career as an interior designer. From preparing just simple CAD drawings and detailed drawings, I learned how to sketch three-dimensional spaces and design.
In two interviews I really sold myself as this; creative, conceptual designer that you can trust with any concept design.
I teach the specifics in my free training. I set up this course because I know how difficult it is to figure out how to progress in the interior design company on your own. So, if you’re interested in finding YOUR superpower – sign up for my free training.
Mid-weight Designer’s Tasks
Your major task as a Mid-weight Interior Designer will be assisting the senior designer in designing and preparing presentations.
You will basically do anything from:
- preparing sample and finishes boards
- preparing InDesign presentations
- CAD drawings
- filing
- filling out all the schedules: finishes, sanitary-ware and ironmongery schedule
There are a lot of Excel spreadsheets in interior design. In addition, it’s worth noting is, you may not be invited to the client presentations. In larger companies it’ll probably be your manager who actually takes your presentation and goes to present it to the client.
As a Mid-weight Interior Designer you can also do CAD drawings. Both the schematic simple design drawings and detailed ones.
If you’re doing mostly CAD work or Revit work you probably be called a CAD technician or CAD designer. In the UK the salary will likely to be similar to the interior designer’s salary.
Senior Interior Designer’s Salary
Senior interior designers tend to make from £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] a year. The highest salaries for senior interior designers are £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] but there is not a lot of them.
In America the salary would be from $[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] per year. This can go up even to $[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT]
However, all these figures are based on London or New York salaries anywhere else the salaries will tend to be slightly lower.
Senior Designer’s Tasks
The usual tasks would be being responsible for the entire project:
- designing
- presenting to the client
- getting feedback
- talking to everyone else involved in the project
- delegating all the tasks
- managing: a lot, a lot of managing…
Salaries of Design Directors
If you’re working for a large, international company, there is a lot of career levels to climb. Firstly, the salary of the design directors really vary by country and the actual city you’re working in. Unfortunately, there is not a lot of information available.
It tends to be quite secret but usually they make around £[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] per year or more and also if you’re in America they can make around $[WATCH THE VIDEO TO FIND OUT] per year and much, much more.
How to Get a Pay Rise?
It’s easier to get a pay rise by changing companies rather than asking for a raise in the same company. This will be due to your current company being familiar with you. That’s why it’s very difficult to sometimes change their minds. Whereas if you apply to a new company with your new and improved skills. Armed with your beautiful, amazing portfolio there is a higher chance to get the higher salary.
What Skills Should I Have?
To sum up, depending on where you want to go and where you want to be, there are different levels of interior designer’s salaries out there.
Firstly, the skills that I found to be the best in terms of getting bigger and higher salary are definitely:
- the great concept thinking: coming up with new ideas
- hand sketching (one of the biggest superpowers)
If you learn hand sketching interiors really well that’s something that is priceless. Every company wants this skill because it makes the presentations so much better. It’s the way to upgrade your salary as an interior designer in the UK or anywhere else.
I’ve put all this information together and created this free interior design training, that will teach you all the skills that are invaluable in the interior design industry. So, if you want to learn how to sketch, how to draw these beautiful three-dimensional spaces or even do amazing concept work – sign up to my free training. Be sure to awaken your amazing skills (YOUR superpower) and get the higher salary you want!
