Hey everybody!
Today we had our work study party! There was so much good food and it was nice to get together and hangout once and a while since I don't usually get to see all the work study students very often. Plus its not bad getting paid to eat either. Actually I found out that one of my work study friends is staying here for the summer to take summer classes! This was pretty exciting since I was thinking about spending the summer here too to find an internship and take some classes but I was worried about spending all my time alone since no one else would be here. But now I know some people staying in the area so it might be really fun! It will also take a lot of stress off of my senior year which will be nice.
This is the last week of classes! Yay! Luckily for me I worked really hard the week before Thanksgiving to get ahead in my projects so I'm not even that stressed at the moment! I even had time to get all of my Christmas shopping done this weekend! I have a HUGE family so Christmas shopping is a long process but my friend and I went to the outlets on Sunday and I'm finished! Things are looking up for the end of the year! Talk to you later!

Only three weeks left!!! Ahhh!! I can't believe the end of the semester is upon us so quickly! And its even more weird for me since I won't be coming back here at the end of Christmas break! I absolutely cannot wait to go abroad though so I'm not too upset about it, even though it will be sad to leave all of my friends behind who are not coming with me. It's pretty busy here for the next two weeks since all our final projects are due.. I have two big projects left to finish and then we get the last week, finals week, just to go over and redo any projects we weren't satisfied with over the semester. So the last week isn't as bad as the next two. On top of the last two projects we have our big end of the year party! This party is really fun and a great chance to see what all the other design departments have been working on. Every major in the warehouse and all of the faculty get together to celebrate the end of the year and there is also a competition! Every year faculty hand out the "gnomes awards." Basically, each faculty member has a little gnome that they award to a project they consider the best for any category they choose, this could be anywhere from presentation, to creativity, to something as simple as line weight. So what all the students do is get out their best project and display it on our desks in hopes of finding a little garden gnome on our desk by the end of the night. Haha It's slightly random but you would be surprised at how coveted a garden gnome can become.

Hey!
So we only have three more weeks of school left! Not including next week of course because it's Thanksgiving and we're really not in school. I'm excited but the end of the semester is kind of bittersweet since I'm going abroad next semester so this is really the end of my year here. Its weird! Like I already have to think of moving all my stuff out of my apartment! Even though I'm sad to leave all my friends who aren't going abroad behind I am so excited to go to London. I went to one of the orientation meetings this week and it made me look forward to going abroad even more. There are so many exciting opportunities there for traveling, field trips, and internships! And I can't wait to live in a completely different culture and experience a different lifestyle!
I'm also very excited because I found an interior design job over Christmas break. A woman my mom is friends with contacted me about redoing her daughter's room as a Christmas present! So I am meeting with her over Thanksgiving break to look at the room and take some measurements as well as to talk about ideas and a price range. I'm so excited though because even though I've had internships this is my first real interior design project that I am working on by myself! Hopefully we can come up with something she likes and maybe that will get my foot in the door for other small projects around the area. It just goes to show how important networking is. I think what I've learned most about networking is that it can come from the most random meetings and once you get the opening or opportunity you should really take advantage of it and take it seriously because you never know what will come from even the smallest jobs.
Well I hope everyone is doing well! Talk to you soon!
Leeanna

Hey!
So last week was our NeoCon field trip! The whole Junior Interior Design class took a field trip down to Baltimore to go to NeoCon and along the way we stopped in Washington D.C and Georgetown to visit some interior design firms! It was a good experience. Georgetown is so cute! All the brick apartment buildings along the water and the cute little shopping areas! I loved it! Plus coming from Syracuse it was so refreshing and such a treat to experience some 70 degree weather! We visited the firm HOK's office and it was pretty exciting since firms are starting to talk to us like we might actually work there some day! It's kind of weird yet cool to think that the firms I'm looking at now may actually be places of future employment. HOK is a pretty big firm and they have offices all over the world. They only do large commercial buildings and they look for versatile employees that have unique and daring ideas. Even though their size and success seem intimidating when we went to the office they all seemed pretty down to earth and nice people. I definitely liked the office and the company values even though I still don't know exactly what avenue of interior design I want to pursue.
NeoCon was pretty cool too! It was in the Baltimore Convention Center so the night before we all got to walk around the inner harbor area which is really pretty with some cute shopping areas. At NeoCon we saw a presentation by the founders of Hellman Chang who were both pretty funny and also really down to earth. We also met with a ton of manufacturers who showed us so many new and innovative products, many of them sustainable. My personal favorite was the ergoErgo chair, which I definitely recommend looking up for any health-minded people out there. It is like a stool almost, but more comfortable, and looks like a plastic spring. It gives you the same type of work out as sitting on an exercise ball, however, it doesn't roll around or tip over like an exercise ball does. I tried one out and they're actually really fun! They just constantly kind of sway back and forth and work out all your core muscles as you sit! The sales representative said they should come out around January... and I'm seriously considering investing in one! Other than meeting with sales reps there were some career advising sessions where professionals would speak to you about the interview process and look over your resumes and portfolios. It was a good experience over all and pretty beneficial. Well I hope you all are doing well! Until next time!
Leeanna

Hey again
So exciting news! Tomorrow we're headed to NeoCon!! yay!! If you don't know what NeoCon is I'll explain it to you a little bit so you can partake in my excitement. NeoCon is one of the biggest trade shows in the interior design field. All kinds of manufacturing companies will attend along with professional designers. It happens every year and this year it is located in Baltimore! It will be a great opportunity to see what's out there as far as products and get some samples of things to use in my projects. We also put together our portfolios and resumes to hand out to professionals in hopes of maybe getting some summer internships. Either way it will be a great networking and research opportunity and I am very excited. I have my new business casual outfit picked out and everything. On our trip we're also going to go to DC and tour some interior design studios which will also be fun and informative. We get to stay over in Baltimore too so that will be fun of course. Other than that I've just been working steadily on our projects! I've been trying to get everything done early since I'm leaving tomorrow and then its Halloween weekend! yay!! well I hope everything is going well for all of you! Until next time!
Leeanna

Hello! So exciting news! My friend Lauren and I are starting the ASID student chapter of Syracuse University! ASID stands for American Society of Interior Designers and it is a national organization that includes both professionals and students. It offers a lot of benefits for joining as well. You can receive discounts on all the major interior design and architecture magazines as well as text books. There are also a lot of events hosted by ASID as well and through the website you can network with professionals which can help with job opportunities and internships. So far for our chapter we've found a faculty adviser and have started working on becoming part of SGA which is the University organization that sponsors clubs. We've also made some brochures to advertise and attract members so we can start putting on events and hosting speakers. I think this club will be a great way to get professionals to be a bigger part of the university. We plan on hosting guest speakers and events to get manufacturers and professionals to come speak to students. These events would be open to all interior designers and could even expand to include the entire design department once we get started. I think this club is so exciting and a great opportunity. I can't wait till it gets off the ground.

So I finally passed my Study abroad application in!!!! Yay!!!! I'll hear back in a couple of weeks whether we got in the program or not and I'm so excited! I really hope I get it, going abroad to London would be an incredible experience. Actually I had a really good experience with the design department yesterday that I thought you all might want to hear about. So, I was trying to finish my portfolio last minute, irresponsible I know, and I couldn't figure out why it wasn't exporting from indesign to a pdf file! I had never used indesign before, which might have been part of the problem, but even still I was really starting to worry that I wouldn't get it finished in the proper format. I had scheduled a meeting with the Chair of the Design department earlier that week to go over my portfolio to make sure that I had everything correct before I submitted it, unfortunately I had to go to the meeting without it being finished. Well, even though she had warned me ahead of time that she couldn't meet for a long time, during the meeting she spent twenty minutes trying to help me figure out my portfolio format. Then, after that was unsuccessful, she tracked down the computer professor and went with me to help me fix it! Through the whole process, not only did I get my portfolio finished, I also learned a lot more about indesign. I was so thankful that she took the time to really help me. In a school as big as Syracuse it really is unique that the chairperson of the entire design department would spend so much time out of her busy day to help a student with a simple computer issue. It really was impressive. In fact after the meeting she followed up with me to ask if I thought a computer seminar would be beneficial to not only me but my entire class. This was a great experience working with the design administration and really is such a benefit to coming to VPA, students on average feel like they get a significant amount of individualized attention. Well I hope you are all doing well! Talk to you next week!

Hello again everyone! I hope things are going well for you all. Classes are seeming to be a little more challenging this year than previous years. I'm taking 6 classes this year for starters unlike the past two years where I took 5 and that alone has made a big difference in my schedule. This year I have classes from 9:30 in the morning till 9:45 at night Monday and Wednesday. Those are long days! However, that means I only have two short classes on Thursday and no classes on Friday. I'm also able to fit work study into my Tuesday class schedule so after Wednesday night everything clears up for a nice weekend! I know a lot of people who schedule their weeks like this. This way they have a four day weekend every week. I can see why people like it, but it is definitely hectic for those three days and not really my style. At least its a good lesson to learn for the next time I make my schedule. The classes themselves are also pretty different. For one I'm taking into to Emerging Enterprises and Entrepreneurship. I've never taken a business class at college so I was a little nervous since math is definitely not one of my strengths, but it turned out I really like this class! The teacher is actually an incredibly successful business man who's only been teaching for 2 semesters now so he's right out of the field and really up to date with today's economic structure. It's also not as math focused and tedious as I pictured a business class to be. Instead we have a lot of lectures and discussions on the techniques behind starting a business and how things work out to be successful. I'm finding it to be pretty interesting stuff and definitely useful to my major since interior design is all about selling your ideas. Plus I hope to own my own firm someday so this minor will come in handy. I have that class later today actually. Thats the only thing I would change about it, it starts at 7 and goes to 9:30. Kind of late, but at least its only one day a week! Well until next time! Have a good week!

Hello again everybody! So its only been a week and we're well on our way to completing our first projects of the semester. This year, unlike the previous one, I have a lot more academic work to do since I'm taking Emerging Enterprises and Entrepreneurship as well as Human Sexuality. Both classes are pretty interesting but EEE looks like its going to be a lot of rigorous work. Along with that, our interior design classes are picking up too! This year is all about office and commercial spaces, which I'm finding I enjoy more than the residential work we did last year. While residential design deals more with materials and the psychological effects of design and space as far as comfort and emotions go, it's starting to seem like office and commercial design has a lot more to do with problem solving. Of course, we still put a lot of emphasis on smart design, using sustainable products and materials, as well as making the space aesthetically pleasing. However, we also have to solve a lot of user problems. For example our first project was to redesign our professor's small office for his architectural firm located here in Syracuse. We had to go and look at the site and you could tell the office had a lot of serious problems as far as adequate space and storage. There were many specifications for what needed to be included in the new design and there were some obvious architectural elements we had to work around, however, besides that we were free to explore different options. In fact, at the end of the project one of our designs may be implemented in the new office! This kind of interior design interests me a lot more since it involves more problem solving instead of simply making a space look interesting. It's like a giant puzzle! So that's what we have been up to in our classes. I hope schools going well for all of you! Until next time! Leeanna

Hello again everybody!
It feels like I just left yesterday! Summer went by so quickly! There have been a lot of changes to SU since I've been gone though. A major one for me has been the move to the Warehouse! I visited the Warehouse for the first time the other day and it is a very interesting place. The building has this cool modern, industrial atmosphere to it and I love how all of the design majors are in one place. It's like the whole building is one big design project. The brand new desks and shop equipment are a plus too, not to mention the building has taken a big leap in its furniture choices using a lot of modern and bold designs. For example most of the chairs on the fourth floor are of Phillipe Stark's brand. So cool. The Warehouse is also only one block away from Armory Square, an area of local restaurants and small boutiques, which is also convenient and only adds to the artistic atmosphere. So even though it's a change, I'm pleased and I think the Warehouse can only improve from here.

Other than that I'm living off campus this year which is also different! I'm only two blocks away from campus which is great because it's not only a short walk to classes but it's not that far from Marshall St. either. Moving into my own place was some what of an awkward transition since I had to figure out things like cable and Internet, which have always been provided and I never had to think about. Not only that but now I go to a landlord with issues instead of calling the school's housing department. It's different but it also gives me a sense of independence and I love the look of the small apartments around here. Most of them are big old houses turned into split levels so they're all really unique and different. Some people actually rent an entire house and then live with 8 or 10 people; I wasn't that adventurous, but still four roommates is enough for me.

Other than that Syracuse is its usual beautiful self! They've added a new dorm, Ernie Davis, but other than that construction's at a minimum and everything seems to be in full swing around here. I hope every one's summer went well and you are all enjoying your first couple days back! Until next time!~

Hello again everyone!
Last week of classes!! Yay! We just finished our final project in interior design and I am so excited to be moving into the final stretch of sophomore year! Our last project was a sustainable building project in which we had to research all the building materials that went into the house as well as the interior and exterior design and all the furnishings and colors. It was a lot of work but also a lot of fun to do because we could pick our own client so each individual project was very personalized. I did my roommate, which was so much fun because I know her so well and she was easily accessible. We had to build a model for this project along with all the drawings. I learned that although model building is a pain its more important for understanding the concept of a design than you think. I realized after doing my model that there were a lot of changes that needed to be made to the original design than I anticipated! So that was quite the adventure.

The weather is finally getting nice here too! Its 70 degrees here today!! Mayfest was this week as well and it was decent weather then too. Mayfest is so much fun, the university cancels classes and just has activities for students on the quad all day. There's also block party coming up which is the annual spring concert, this year the artist is Ben Folds! so that will be fun! Basically, I love the end of the year at Syracuse its so rewarding to kick back and enjoy the weather after such a long semester! I hope everything is going well for you! Until next time!
Leeanna

Hey Everyone!
So things are warming up here at Syracuse and everyone's loving it. People are hanging out on the quad and everyone seems more social when it's warm out! Classes are going well! We just finished a big project in Interior Design, the adaptive reuse condo project. My client was Steven Grasse and considering he is such an outrageous and eccentric person it made designing the condo a little difficult. However, it also allowed me to use different and more unusual materials! For example, I used priva-lite glass as the walls in the bathroom. This glass is really cool, its manufactured so that it can go from being completely clear to foggy and opaque with the flip of a switch! Other people in class found some really cool things too. One girl found ceramic tile that is made in a certain way so that the titanium in the product actually reacts with natural sunlight and cleans the air in the same way plants clean the air when they photosynthesise! That's amazing!

Doing these more extensive interior design projects has made me realize how important knowing different materials in the market is to creating a good design. I have definitely spent more time searching the web and reading magazines and advertisements looking for better and new materials.

I've finally figured out my housing for next year as well! I'm living off campus! I'm really excited to finally get my own place! The house is great too, its huge and only two blocks off campus so its really close. Plus we get a balcony! There are four of us girls living upstairs and five guys in the downstairs apartment... so a lot of people in one space will make things very interesting I'm thinking. I can't wait though and most of all I'm glad I have it all settled.

We also found out who is coming to Mayfest this year! Ben Folds and Guster! That's exciting too! I like how they switch up the musical genres every year. Last year they had Fergie and Sean Kingston so this year they definitely picked a different avenue!

Well I hope everyone is doing well with their college search! Till next time!

Hello again everyone,
So its snowing like crazy here in Syracuse! Finally! I was starting to get worried winter was over early this year it had been so warm out lately. Things are going well here though. We only have a few more weeks until spring break and midterms! Yay! We got some new projects in my design classes. One of them is designing a small condo in the Hotel Syracuse, which is a historic hotel in the city of Syracuse. It is really pretty inside with incredible ballrooms and lounges. However, its been out of use for a while now and has started to fall apart on the inside. So now they are restoring the building and turning the old hotel rooms into condos for rent. There doing a lot of other things in the city around that area too. I'm pretty sure the project is called symphony place and they are planning on putting in some out door park like areas, restaurants and entertainment areas kind of to revitalize the downtown area. So our project is to design a condo for a specific client who has some sort of ties to the Syracuse area. It's kind of a complicated project though because you have to design around the existing building requirements and historic atmosphere of the space. But its cool that you can pick your own client and design specifically to them. I picked Steven Grasse, he's pretty radical and graduated from Newhouse for advertising. He's going to be a lot of fun to design for because his ideas are so insane. I'm thinking of going in the swank bachelor pad direction..
So thats what's going on here! I hope everything is going well with all of you!

Hello everyone!
So its been a while since I last wrote on the blog!! Things are going well here at Syracuse! We just finished our first set of projects in interior design! One of them was pretty cool and took a different approach than the usual projects we have. We had to draw out the floor and site plans of our childhood home from memory. We also had to make a list of all the materials and map out the heating and plumbing systems as best we could. It's really interesting to see how when you really analyze something how much you don't actually remember! This project was supposed to be really informal and we couldn't even use rulers! It was really hard to switch to such a messy approach after spending a whole semester being really neat and professional looking! In the end, the focus was more on connecting with an audience and presentation of a plan. It was fun, just really different.

We had more guest speakers this week as well! On Wednesday we had all of our design classes cancelled and had a "Day of Play" in which the university had guest speakers come in to talk about the importance of play in design and exploration. It was really inspiring to hear these really successful business owners and designers come and speak about how play in the workforce is what has set their companies apart from others. They also explored how play is an inherent need for human beings and gave many different examples of how a lack of play can cause many problems for someone psychologically. I enjoyed the lectures a lot because as a psychology minor I thought they approached both fields that I'm interested in; interior design and psychology.

In my materials class we had a representative come from 3form! If you haven't heard of 3form you should definitely look them up! They design different products and materials for interior designing and all of their stuff is really inventive and environmentally friendly! The new products they were showing us had such a forward way of thinking and really stretched the boundaries for what I thought was possible in different materials! We also got free hats.. a little bit of company propaganda but thats okay.

Well I hope your college search is going well! Good luck with everything! I'll have more to come later!

Hello again everyone!
Well, it's a new semester here at Syracuse and it has started off just as interesting as always. In fact, the first week of the semester we didn't even have any classes! All of the interior and industrial design students had all of their classes cancelled and instead we did a week long charrette centered around energy conservation. There were a lot of visiting designers and environmentally friendly companies that came and presented to students all day Monday and Tuesday and then for the rest of the week the groups competed to win a chance to go to the national level and compete for $10,000 and your group's idea published in Metropolis Magazine! It was also really cool to work with people from different majors. You can really see the differnce in how we function and think about problems, it seemed as if interior designers had a much more logical and systematic approach to solving a problem while industrial designers were ready to dive right in and just go for it! It really made you open your eyes to different approaches and thinking processes! So this is the actual real first week of classes for us and so far they look pretty exciting. For interior design we're taking a materials class in which we learn about the different materials out there in use now as well as the pros and cons to different aesthetics and applications. It will be interesting to learn the technical names of different things and learn how to work in a professional environment when it comes to ordering and selecting different materials. We're also going to explore environmentally friendly materials and the struggle between sustanibility and being aesthetically pleasing and functional. Well, that is what is going on so far in the semester, but like I said it just started and I'm sure we'll have more to talk about later! Bye!