Body Of Knowledge

In the written surveys, few practitioners are aware of the body of knowledge of interior design. When the detailed areas were mentioned, a few respondents recalled “human environmental needs” and “design” were covered in their school syllabus (though not in depth). There is high consensus that design, knowledge of products and materials, communication and professional practice are important skills for interior designers. However, relatively fewer practitioners consider knowledge about interior construction, building codes and regulations to be important qualities for interior designers to possess. When interior design company employees are asked to rate themselves on their competence on such areas as fire regulations, building codes, intellectual property rights, green design and laws of contract, only between 38-40% rate themselves as very competent or somewhat competent in these areas, while only 23% rate themselves as very or somewhat competent in laws of contract. In focus group discussions, some practitioners stated that these areas are not relevant to their daily work. For some of them, the company they work for may be involved mainly with residential projects, so the above areas are not as relevant to their practice. Practitioners who work on larger scale projects say that there are usually other specialists such as architects, structural engineers and authorized persons on the team who could advise on these matters, and therefore they do not need to be very competent in these areas, although they do consider it to be an advantage to have some basic knowledge about them.