Material Girls has been on my radar for quite some time now. You see one of my friends designed all of the illustrations on their site and ever since she showed it to me I’ve been hooked. For those of you that are new to Material Girls must know that it is a design blog that has posts from 5 different ladies that have design business spread out from coast to coast. It’s nice to see design trends in Texas and then read about the latest design event in NY. Founder Emily Johnston Larkin took time out of her busy day to let us into what she gets done in a day.

Enjoy!
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Thanks so much for including me, Camila! I’ve been following this series since the beginning, so was incredibly excited that I was asked to participate.

8 am- Wakeup! I’m such a night owl and stay up until all hours, so I usually try to sleep as long as possible in the morning and have mastered the art of getting ready in forty five minutes.  Once I wake up, I have my usual OJ and cereal for breakfast and take Zoey outside…

Taylor and I are heading on a roadtrip out to Keller today for a meeting so comfy flats are needed-

9 am- I head to the office to meet Taylor and gather up all of our samples for the client meeting. Realize that I left my cell phone at home, which seems to happen at least once a week.

10 am- Forty five minutes later, we arrive in Keller to meet with my client Stacey, whom I’ve been working with for about a year and a half.  Keller is not incredibly far from Dallas, but it feels like a whole different world.  The houses on Stacey’s street consist of a ton of land and most of her neighbors have animals like Longhorns and horses.  It’s so much more calm and pretty out here.

Taylor had never seen the house before, so I gave her the official tour and then had her go around and take updated room shots for our files of the spaces that we have been working on. Meanwhile, Stacey and I go room to room discussing ideas and what is still left to do.

{The piano room- working on getting custom drapes and end tables made}

{Pool bath- this unique mirror was a rare find for less than $100!}

{Home Office- almost finished….}

{The family room- we found all of this recently at summer market}

12 pm- Updated room photos have been taken but we are still at Stacey’s house selecting drapery fabrics for the piano room.  We settle on a Robert Allen warm gray silk that’s at a very reasonable pricepoint (which is good because we need thirty two yards of it!)

1 pm- I think we’ve covered everything. Let’s head back to Dallas and go to lunch!

2 pm- Taylor and I decide to “dine in” for lunch….meaning, dine in the car (pretty typical since we are always running around).  Does this lunch scenario look familiar to other designers out there? Please tell me that I’m not the only one who does this!

2:30 pm- Drop Taylor off at the office and then head back to my house to pick up Zoey and some wedding presents that Ben’s dad dropped off on our porch.  Race in the house with a million things in my hand and end up dropping my Chick-Fil-A on the porch in the process- oy!

Luckily, this sweet lil furball happily greets me at the door and I forget all about the craziness of this day.  I then end up finding my cell phone in my robe pocket, so I guess all is now good in the world.

3pm- Head back to the office, drop Zoey off with Taylor, and then drive over to the design district to return and order some fabrics.

First stop- Fabricut- where I returned a fabric book and ordered this amazing zig zag silk to make into living room drapes for a client.

Second stop- Pindler and Pindler.  Chatted with my friend June who is one of the showroom managers there and selected and ordered some fabric to make into tape trim for the same client’s kitchen roman shades.

Done and done!

4 pm- 6:30 pm- Head back to the office to answer emails and finish up some work before the weekend (the office is a complete disaster with project materials and random furniture for clients all over the floor, so enter at your own risk!)

{Somehow, I always end up working on the floor….maybe that’s another designer-ism}

6:45 pm- My car says it’s 110 degrees outside, so ballet flats are just not an option anymore.  I break out the flip flops without regard to my chipped toenail polish and head to Crate and Barrel on my way home to look at a slipcovered sofa for a client.

7pm- I make sure the C&B sleeper sofa looks good with our Duralee and Quadrille fabrics for Fallen’s project…it passes the test as the perfect white…let’s order!

8pm- By this time I am starving and pretty tired, so I pick up Ben and we head to one of our favorite low key Mexican restaurants, Desperados for some beers and enchiladas!

9:30 pm- We go home and take Zoey for a walk around the neighborhood and then give her a much needed bath.

10 pm- Yawn! Ready to catch up on my Us magazine and then fall asleep watching tv…but there’s a mysterious knock at the door.  It appears we have some unexpected visitors with multiple bottles of wine (and chocolate.)  I think this is worth staying up for! Ben’s sister, brother in law, and one of our other couple friends end up entertaining us all night- much better than Us Weekly!

1 am- Everyone finally heads out- GOOD NIGHT!

Thanks so much for letting me share my day with your readers, Camila- hope you enjoyed!
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First off how cute is Zoey! Oh I just wanted to grab her. Second, how amazing are those orange chairs in the office? And lastly obsessed with the artwork above Emily’s fireplace. Stunning. Loved reading about her day and totally salivating over her Chick-Fil-A! They are one of my favorite fast food stops and sadly we don’t have any in the NY area. My heart sunk when it hit the floor. So sad.

Next Friday we’ll be taking a break from IN HER SHOES since it’s the start of the holiday weekend, but don’t worry It will be back after Labor Day. Any new ladies you are dying to see featured? Here is who we have featured in the past.