Interior Design
Portland’s Master Certified Interior Designers. 20 years, 4.9 on Houzz, top 2% on Buildzoom.
Design a home that fits how you live in it.
A well-designed room looks inevitable, as though it could not have been any other way. Getting there is the work: rooms that hold together, materials that age well, and lighting that works at every time of day. Good interior design is what makes a house feel resolved rather than assembled.
Interior design at C&K works two ways. Most often it is paired with one of our remodels, where the designer and the build team work from the same plan. It is also available on its own, as a standalone service alongside another contractor or with no contractor at all. Both are core offerings, not a side door, and the deliverables are built to suit whichever path fits your project.
Interior Design Services We Offer
Interior design at C&K is more than picking finishes. It is a coordinated set of services that take a room from layout to lived-in, available as a standalone engagement or paired with a C&K remodel.
- Space planning and layout: traffic patterns, sightlines, and how natural light moves through the room across the day.
- Custom furniture and built-ins: cabinetry, window seats, fireplace surrounds, mudroom lockers, and pieces designed for the room rather than pulled from a showroom floor.
- Finish and material selection: cabinetry, stone, tile, flooring, and hardware specified to read as one palette rather than a set of separate choices.
- Window treatments and wall finishes: drapery, shades, plaster, Roman clay, paint, and wallpaper, specified to read alongside each other.
- Artwork and accessory curation: art placement, decorative pieces, rugs, and the styling that makes a room feel finished.
- Sustainable design options: low-VOC finishes, FSC-certified millwork, and energy-efficient lighting specified where they fit the design.
Interior Design Examples
Every room starts in a different place. Here are three projects that landed differently
Historic, East Tabor
Whole-house interior design for a designated historic landmark
This home in East Tabor is a designated historic landmark, the kind of house where interior design has to work with the architecture rather than over it. We designed the interiors for the entire house, bringing every room forward for how the family lives today while keeping faith with what makes the home significant: its proportions, its period detail, and the materials that belong to a house of its era. The result reads as considered rather than redecorated, current in how it functions and true to the landmark it has always been.
West Hills Kitchen
Design coordinated with a kitchen remodel, finishes specified before framing closed up
For this West Hills kitchen, the design was set alongside the construction, with finishes and fixtures specified before the walls closed up. Charcoal flat-front cabinetry, honed black granite, and a professional Wolf range give the room a quiet, modern weight, while an island cooktop and stainless hood anchor it beneath vaulted ceilings and clerestory light. Getting the selections settled early is what let the finished kitchen read as one deliberate design rather than a set of separate decisions.
Lake Oswego Whole-Home Design
Redesign and custom millwork throughout
This Lake Oswego home was redesigned throughout, with custom millwork carrying one design language from room to room. A white fireplace surround and paneled built-ins anchor the living room, layered with brass lighting, crown molding, and furnishings collected rather than matched. The result is a home that feels composed and personal at once, warm enough to live in and considered down to the trim.
Talk to C&K about your interiors
Why Homeowners Choose C&K Custom Remodeling
The advantage of designing with C&K is that design and build sit under one roof, accountable to one timeline and one budget. The details that usually get lost between a designer and a builder are handled by one team here.
- Master Certified credentials: Lloyd Martindale holds both the Master Certified Remodeler (MCR) and Master Certified Kitchen & Bath Remodeler (MCKBR) designations, held by fewer than 1% of contractors nationwide.
- Design-build coordination: the designer and builder are on the same team, so lighting, blocking, and millwork details are right the first time.
- Builders who can make the drawing real: long-tenured cabinetmakers and finish carpenters who can build the millwork on the page.
- Selections that hold up: materials chosen for a family home, not a styled photograph
- Two engagement models, both fully supported: paired with a C&K remodel, the designer and builder are one team; standalone, the deliverables (drawings, specs, samples) are tight enough that any contractor can execute them or the homeowner can manage purchasing directly.
- Verified track record: 4.9 Houzz rating, top 2% Buildzoom.
Interior Design Cost in Portland
Think of interior design as an investment in getting the whole project right, rather than a line-item price. What it costs depends on scope, whether the room count is one or the whole house, and whether the work is standalone or coordinated with a C&K remodel.
We bill interior design hourly, and we can provide an estimate up front so you know the likely investment before the work begins. How the engagement is structured depends on the project:
- Single-room direction: scoped to the room and the procurement involved, with an estimate of hours up front.
- Whole-home design: phased across concept, specification, and install, estimated by milestone.
- Design coordinated with a remodel: folded into the design-build construction project, where it most often lives.
Furniture, lighting, and rug budgets are tracked separately from the design fee, transparently throughout procurement, so you always see what goes to product and what goes to design.
Why Invest in Professional Interior Design
Interior design is the part of a home project that holds everything else together. It is what keeps a series of good individual decisions from adding up to a room that does not quite work.
- Functionality and flow: rooms that work for how the household actually lives, not just how a magazine spread reads.
- Property value: a cohesive, well-designed home holds appraisal value beyond the cost of the finishes themselves.
- Time and decision savings: a designer handles vendor selection, sample tracking, procurement, and install coordination.
- Trade-only access: furniture, lighting, fabric, and millwork sources homeowners cannot buy directly.
The 6-Step Process
Every interior design project follows the same path, so you always know what is next.
- Initial consultation: we walk the home, learn how the family uses each room, and review inspiration and the existing pieces you want to keep.
- Site measure: floor plans, ceiling heights, window and door dimensions, and mechanical locations documented before design begins.
- Concept and direction: floor plans, palette boards, material samples, and a clear style direction you sign off on.
- Specification: every finish, fixture, light, piece of millwork, and piece of furniture pulled into a tracked spec list.
- Coordination with construction: lighting layouts, blocking, niches, and millwork details handed to the contractor before framing closes up.
- Procurement, install, and final styling: ordering, tracking, on-site placement of furniture and art, and the final styling walkthrough that makes a room feel finished.
See what C&K can do with your home
Materials, Finishes, and Style Directions
A design holds up because of the materials and proportions behind it, not the trend it is borrowing from. The specifics are what separate a room that still looks right in ten years from one that looked current for a season.
What we can specify, by name:
- Millwork: white oak and walnut, paint-grade poplar built-ins, rift-cut veneer paneling, and hand-applied finishes.
- Stone and metal: soapstone, honed quartzite, unlacquered brass, and blackened steel, chosen for how they age rather than how they photograph on day one.
- Wall finishes: plaster, Roman clay, limewash, paint-grade trim, and high-quality wallpaper.
- Textiles: wool and sisal rugs, performance upholstery that holds up to a real family, and custom drapery and Roman shades.
- Style directions common to Portland-area homes: Craftsman-rooted modern, Tudor revival, Pacific Northwest mid-century, modern farmhouse, transitional and modern.
FAQs About Interior Design
Do you only work on full remodels, or can you design a single room?
We do both. Interior design is available as a standalone engagement for a single room, and it is also part of our whole-home and remodel work. The deliverables scale to the size of the project.
Can we use furniture, art, and rugs we already own?
Yes, and we encourage it. Pieces you love and want to keep become part of the plan, and we design around them rather than starting from a blank room.
How is interior design priced?
We bill hourly and provide an estimate up front, so you have a clear sense of the investment before the work begins. Furniture, lighting, and rug budgets are tracked separately from the design fee.
What is the difference between an interior designer and an interior decorator?
A decorator works with surfaces and furnishings in an existing space. A designer also handles space planning, millwork, lighting, and the construction-side details, which is why design-build coordination matters. Our work spans both.
Do we have to use C&K for construction to hire your design team?
No. Design is most often bundled with our build work, but it is a genuine standalone service. When it is standalone, the drawings and specs are detailed enough for any contractor to execute, or for you to manage purchasing directly.
Service Area
We design for homes across the Portland metro, with working familiarity of the area’s architecture, from Craftsman and Tudor to mid-century and modern farmhouse, and the trade-only supply chains for furniture, lighting, fabric, and millwork that come with it.
Portland · Lake Oswego · West Linn · Dunthorpe · NW Portland · West Hills · Beaverton · Tigard · Tualatin
A room is finished when everything works together.
That is the work, and it begins with a conversation. We will walk your home, talk through how you want it to live, and show you what we have designed in homes like yours.
