Interior designer fees: how they are calculated
It is often the first question, and rightly so: what does an interior architect cost? The answer depends less on your apartment than on how the fees are calculated — and on that, not every studio works the same way.
Here is how the profession bills, how we bill — a fixed fee, agreed beforehand — and why that difference matters to you. You will also see that a project is always designed around your budget, whatever it is.
The three ways of billing
In the profession, fees are calculated in three main ways. All three exist, all three are legitimate — but they do not create the same interests.
- A percentage of the works
- The studio takes a share of the building cost — often 10 to 15% for a full mission, sometimes less for design only. Its fees therefore follow what the works cost, up or down.
- Per square metre
- A rate per square metre to be designed, usually decreasing: the rate drops as the surface grows.
- A fixed fee
- A set price, worked out before starting from the design time the project requires. This is how we work.
The difference is not trivial. Billing as a percentage of the works, by construction, grows as the building cost grows. A fixed fee does not.
Our fees do not depend on what your works cost.
With us: a fixed fee, agreed beforehand
We work on a fixed fee. Before we start, we look at your project — the surface, the number of rooms to rethink, the furniture to design, the level of detail expected — and we work out the design time it represents. That time becomes a price, and that price is fixed.
What you pay for is our design work: the plans, the research, the back-and-forth, the perspectives, the file. Nothing else. The amount is set out in writing before the first pencil stroke, and it does not move along the way.
It is as simple to understand as it is to check: a larger project takes more hours, so it costs more. A more modest one takes fewer. Surface and ambition count; the cost of your works does not.
Why this changes everything for you
When a studio is paid a percentage of the building cost, every euro added to the works increases its fees. Nobody does this in bad faith — but the studio's interest and yours do not point in exactly the same direction.
With a fixed fee, that question disappears. We have no interest whatsoever in your works costing more. If the fairest solution is to keep the parquet rather than replace it, to move one partition rather than three, to choose a beautiful material in one place rather than everywhere — we will tell you, and it will change nothing in what you pay us.
Nor are we paid by the contractor or the craftsmen. We do not carry out the works: we earn nothing on them. When you have no one, we search — genuinely: we look for who will know how to run a project like yours, with its own constraints, its schedule, its particular trades. It is research, not an address book.
What makes the price vary
Three things make our fee vary, and all of them come down to the design time your project requires.
- Surface and rooms
- The more spaces to rethink, the more plans, choices and drawings.
- Designed furniture
- Every made-to-measure piece is a project within the project, with its own drawings and details.
- The level of detail
- A layout plan alone does not take the same work as a complete file.
What does not make the price vary: the value of your property, the cost of your works, or the budget you devote to it. A carefully designed 30 m² studio can take as much work as a much larger apartment with simple volumes.
We start from your budget
Tell us what you want to devote to it. It is not an indiscreet question: it is the project's first piece of data. A budget stated early does not reduce ambition — it directs it. We know where to put the noble material and where to save it, what deserves to be designed to measure and what can be found very well elsewhere, what must be done now and what can wait for a second stage.
The mission itself adjusts: a layout plan alone, a complete project, a single piece of furniture, an apartment designed room by room over several months. We have never turned down a project for being too modest — we have often helped do a great deal with little. The most beautiful projects are not always the most expensive.
Every project can be assessed and budgeted, yours included. A first conversation is usually enough: you describe your apartment and what you expect from it, and you receive a clear, itemised quote before any commitment.
Your questions
Do you take a percentage of the building cost?
No. We charge a fixed fee, based on the design time your project requires and agreed before we start. A larger project takes more work, so it costs more; a more modest one costs less. What never enters the calculation is what your works cost — and that is precisely what leaves us free to advise you towards the most economical solution.
Are you paid by the craftsmen or the contractor?
Never. We do not carry out the works and we are paid by none of the companies that do. If you have no contractor, we look for the one who will suit your project: that search is part of the mission agreed at the outset, and is billed nowhere else.
Can the fixed fee increase during the project?
Not for what was agreed. The fee covers the mission described in the quote, back-and-forth included — redrawing a sketch until it feels like you is part of the work. If you add a room or a piece of furniture along the way, we discuss it together, and you decide.
Can we take only part of the mission?
Yes. A layout plan alone, a single piece of furniture, a complete project with perspectives and file: each mission can have its own fixed fee. You choose what you need, and you know what it costs before starting.
Is the quote free?
Yes. The first conversation and the quote are free and without commitment. You only pay when you decide to start the project.
What if my budget is tight?
Tell us from the first conversation: that is where we start. A modest budget changes what we design, not the care we put into it — we prioritise, we keep what can be kept, we work in stages if needed. Many of our finest projects were born from a tight budget.
