A design kickoff meeting is one of the first steps we take once you sign on as a client with Alma Homes. It helps us align on your preferences, needs, and wants, and lays the groundwork for the rest of the project. Today we’re letting you be a fly on the wall of one of these meetings and giving you an inside look at the individual agenda items we cover!

#1 Your lifestyle

The first and most important thing we tend to discuss during this initial meeting is your current lifestyle. It might feel counter intuitive, but this is actually one of the most informative pieces of the conversation we have. How we design a space for two empty nesters who eat out 5 times a week is completely different from how we would for a family that’s cooking 21 meals a week at home. Knowing the traffic patterns of your typical day-to-day, and how much use each space will get, helps us optimize everything to fit your needs!

#2 The pain points you have in your current space

The second thing we like to discuss is the challenges you’re having with your current home. Struggling to get your kids through their morning routines before school starts? We might recommend a dual vanity with separated water closet so that more than one kiddo can be moving through their morning at once. Knowing your sticking points helps us create meaningful solutions that ensure they don’t show up again in your new space.

#3 How you want to feel in your new space

This is where we start to dip our toes into the visual side of things, but we like to start with a feeling. Telling us how you want each room to make you feel allows us to start more broadly and explore possibilities before jumping directly to a specific design style or aesthetic. Do you want a bedroom that feels zen and a kitchen that feels creatively inspiring? This info allows us to explore different design choices that will help us achieve those feelings.

#4 Your inspiration and design preferences

And finally, we get to your visual inspiration and aesthetic preferences. This step actually begins prior to the meeting, when clients fill out a detailed design intake form that helps us gather photo inspiration. During the meeting, we discuss what specific things you like about your design inspiration images in order to make sure we’re aligned before jumping into the moodboarding process!

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