Today we’d like to introduce you to Sybille Zimmermann.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
Interior Design has always been a passion of mine. I grew up spending a lot of time with my grandfather at his luxury carpentry shop in Switzerland. While watching him work, I’d dream and sketch up furniture for my room and from time to time, my grandpa would stop what he was doing and make some of the simpler pieces. He was the inspiration for me to one day have my own business.
I’m a creative person but not necessarily a natural at drawing. Industries like fashion or design require a skill I just didn’t have. So like most people in Switzerland, I decided to go to Business School and pursue a career in banking. But, that wasn’t a fit for me either. I did finish though and after my two years of school and a year of practical training, I decided to take off a year and go to San Diego to study English. It was then when things started to take shape. I met an American boy, fell in love and discovered Interior design. I loved San Diego but I loved him too and decided to follow his journey, which led us to move around the country to places like South Dakota and Wisconsin. Needless to say, being passionate about big cosmopolitan cities and being near water, that didn’t work out so well. So, I went back to Switzerland, spent another year working at UBS to save money with the goal of pursuing my real dream of becoming an interior designer.
So, in January of 1998, I moved to Los Angeles to study Interior Architecture at UCLA Extension. It was perfect, at that time the school was located at the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica and was full of international people, so I felt at home. I studied for four years and over that time had a handful of internships. After graduating in 2002 I got a job, not my dream job, but a job nonetheless with a small firm doing healthcare design. It was a start, and two years later I got a job at the renowned Architectural firm Gensler. It was great. I was able to learn a lot from a lot of really smart and creative people, form a large network of vendor relationships and start to understand how large-scale design projects work and how businesses are run. I got to work with Fortune 500 clients in a fast-paced environment. It was amazing but over time, I found myself not expressing my self creatively, I needed more. Which led me to Commune Design, which at the time was a small boutique, not the big firm it’s known as today. It was amazing, working on more bespoke projects with clients like Ace Hotel Palm Springs, Chateau Marmont and Juicy Couture store and a lot of high-end residential clients was exactly what I wanted. My dreams were coming true! I couldn’t have asked for more– great projects, great people– but then 2008 came along and the economy crashed. Myself along with a lot of really talented people were out of work.
But I was lucky, I had a close friend who at the time was working for a big real estate investment company and they just finished a new development in Marina Del Rey and he was the one who jump-started me into starting my own company by giving me two model rooms. Even better, he gave me complete creative control– I could design them however I wanted! It was liberating, I was all in, I drank the Kool Aid and never wanted to go back to the corporate world– and Studio Zimmermann was born. I’ll be honest, I struggled after, I realized clients just don’t fall off trees. So it was one job here, one job there. I took everything that came my way and anything I could find, from meeting people at parties to finding clients on Craigslist. But it was those experiences that I was able to learn my aesthetic, how to client manage, the type of client I wanted to work with, how to source materials, and what I wanted Studio Zimmermann to stand for. Slowly things started to take shape working with commercial and residential clients.
Over the years, I found commercial clients, the ones that appreciate and understand the need for beautiful design also run on a clock– the jobs actually end. I also love doing residential as well. Bringing joy to an individual or family through design is the best feeling and why my company likes to keep a balance between both commercial — multi-family housing rehabs, fashion showrooms — and high-end residential. The brand today stands for ‘considered quality’, providing a suite of services that can bring any clients vision to life– on time and on budget. We believe in holistic design and purchasing with purpose over insufferable design—less is more.
Has it been a smooth road?
It hasn’t been. At one point shortly before I graduated at UCLA, I decided to find an Internship in Switzerland as an Interior Designer to maybe find my way back home, it was easier said than done. I must have called at least 20 or 30 Architectural firms in Switzerland where the idea of hiring an interior designer wasn’t part of how firms, at least in Switzerland, staffed. Most would ask,” What I would bring to a job as an “interior decorator?” They couldn’t see the value. It was demoralizing. Back then, interior design really wasn’t a thing and it was a male dominant architectural world. There was one young Interior Design firm in Zurich that offered me an unpaid Internship but I had to turn it down– I needed to make money to pay for my next semester at UCLA. To this day, I think about what if I had taken that internship. Where would I be now? How would it have changed the course of my life and career?
But things weren’t simple here in the states either. I eventually needed a Green Card to stay. I couldn’t just take any job, it had to be with a company that was willing to sponsor me. I was lucky, I found a small boutique firm who was willing to hire and sponsor my work visa and then once I got my job at Genlser, I was able to get my Green Card. It was hard. Not being from here didn’t give me the network other people have so everything I built was from the ground up. Even my accent at times presents an issue, lots of potential clients who aren’t a direct referral have to get past my Swiss accent– which is not to say that sometimes my accent is a plus—it is, but sometimes it’s a disadvantage which to some extent I understand. Running a business and starting a family was hard as well. As things finally were starting to flow and my firm starting really to grow both in projects and staff, Covid-19 hit and as a result now find myself along with my husband juggling homeschooling and work life. It’s been tough, but we are finally getting our groove back and are only looking ahead.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Studio Zimmermann – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of and what sets you apart from others.
I love collaborating with clients that want my approach in comfortable California living with a European elegance and minimalism. My experience over the years has afforded me the opportunity to do a wide variety of styles—60’s funk, traditional European to Southern California beach. So my approach to design is as a storyteller—what’s the story that my client wants to tell?
I can’t stress the importance of bringing on a designer as early as possible. My expertise in space planning is essential to bringing a project to life. Combined with my creative approach to design and collaborating with my client’s results in a holistic design approach. The studio motto is: more is not better; purchase with purpose.
Having worked in a variety of design disciplines gives me a special edge of crossing different project types and staying up to date in commercial and residential design. This way my spaces don’t have ‘a look’ but a ‘feel’.
I’m most proud of having been able to sustain my business for over ten years and been able to grow a portfolio with a range of projects and styles. I am at a place where I can take the projects I like and fit my studio well and pass on the ones that are not a good fit. It’s a great place to be.
What role has luck (good luck or bad luck) played in your life and business?
My husband says luck is timing plus being prepared so when I think about luck, I think about it in a couple of ways. Growing up, I was lucky my mom gave me the opportunity to pursue my dreams, even if that meant putting hers on hold. She’s always supported me and still does. It wasn’t easy. My dad left us when I was a toddler so money was always tight–sending me abroad to study English then back to study design for four years at UCLA, not to mention putting up with all my shenanigans. But she did it so in that respect I’m very lucky.
Professionally, I was also very lucky. In 2008 when the economy crashed and lost my job, my friend, who I mentioned earlier trusted me to hire me for his project. So, to my husband’s point, the timing was right to take the chance but it was my being prepared that gave my friend the confidence to hire me, even though it was a risk. It is very rare that friends work with friends, it’s tricky and most people don’t want to go there, but my friend Devang not only jumpstarted my career but has continued to support me over the years. Crossing my fingers that my good fortune will be the result of being well prepared at the right time.
Pricing:
- On site design consultation $500
- Minimum retainer of $40,000
Contact Info:
- Website: www.studiozimmermann.com
- Phone: 310.383.5122
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/studio.zimmermann/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/studiozimmermann
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/studiozimmermann/
Image Credit:
Claudio Santnini, Nico Marques
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