We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ivanna Vizcaya Sperling a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Ivanna, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.
The easy answer would be to say college. I have a Bachelor’s of Science in Interior Design and I did graduate with multiple skills from school.I learned different design software programs, color theory and many other useful tools but my real journey began out on the field. I learned to be a great designer through my experience in multiple areas of design. Every project and every client is different, therefore each a different learning opportunity. I have been tested creatively, mentally, and physically as a designer on multiple projects. I would not change or speed up my learning process because every step I have taken has gotten me to where I am now in my career. I would say that I would have been more aware of my early opportunities and challenged myself more. I also think having experience in sales has been an essential part of learning and growing as a designer. At the end of the day I am selling my brand, and if I believe in my brand other people will believe in it as well.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
My name is Ivanna Vizcaya Sperling and I am an Interior Designer based in Los Angeles. I am Mexican American, was born and raised in San Diego. I have been a creative person my entire life, and have been influenced by my bi cultural upbringing, travels, studies abroad, etc. As I mentioned I have worked in different areas of this field; residential, commercial, multifamily, and staging. But now I am focused on residential interior designr and provide the following services: Virtual Design, Home Styling, and Private Design. I am very proud of providing a service for the masses, and being able to bring luxury to every space no matter how big or small the budget. I love creating beautiful spaces and working with different clients.
Have you ever had to pivot?
I have been in this industry for 7+ years now. I worked in residential design, multifamily design, some hospitality, and staging. I have learned from every single project and experience throughout my career and recently made a big change. For the past 4 years I have been doing private design and home staging, and during the 2020 Pandemic I began a new venture that allowed me to work with new clients remotely. I wanted to share my experience as a High end LA Interior Designer. Having worked with celebrity clients, and multi million dollar homes I have an eye for luxury and I wanted to bring those elements to everyone, whether you have a studio, apartment, mansion, great design in for everyone and that is what my virtual project is about. I make the design process user friendly and at a lower cost for my clients, by allowing them to make my vision come to life ( I create everything visually and the clients purchase all items). I have been able to style homes, and have a lot of fun working with a variety of clientele. I have left staging and am focusing on Virtual Design, Private Residential Design, & Home Styling. I change is always scary but as they say the best is yet to come. I am very excited to keep growing, learning, and for all my new future clients.
Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?
For me. the most effective strategy for growing my clientele is giving 1000% on each job I do no matter how big or small. Treating each project and client as a priority has been the best way I have grown my clientele. Every job I complete comes with new client prospects, whether I get recommended by a previous client or I connect with new people through ongoing projects. I think it is also extremely important to be kind , as cliche as it sounds you just never know who you meet or who you will connect in the future. Anyone is a potential client and networking goes a long way.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: designsbyvizcaya
- Other: TikTok: @designsbyvizcaya
Image Credits
the photo of myself in the white suit was taken by photographer Ivanna Bañales ig: ivannabanalesphoto the other photos were taken by me & some are my digital boards