Interior Designers Need to Be Louder in the Sustainability Conversation

I think interior designers need to become much louder in the sustainability conversation. When we talk about sustainable buildings, the discussion often moves quite naturally toward architecture, energy systems, solar power, water efficiency, building envelopes and green building certification. All of that matters, but there is another layer of the built environment that changes far more frequently over the life of a building: the interior.

An office building may stand for forty or fifty years, but its interiors may change several times during that period. Companies move in and out, workplaces are refurbished, hotels reposition themselves, retail environments change, healthcare facilities adapt, furniture gets replaced, partitions move, ceilings come down and finishes are stripped out. Sometimes that change is absolutely necessary because the organisation has grown, the business has changed or the space genuinely no longer works. But sometimes we also replace things simply because they no longer feel new.

And this is where I think interior designers need to look at ourselves a little more carefully. We are often the people deciding what leaves the building and what comes back in. We influence what gets demolished, what can be retained, which materials are specified, how much material is used, where it comes from, how it is installed, how long it is likely to last, whether it can be repaired and whether it can be reused. Eventually, we also influence whether what we design today becomes a useful resource tomorrow or simply waste. That is a significant responsibility, and it is why sustainability should not sit somewhere on the edge of interior design practice. It needs to sit much closer to the centre.

Sometimes sustainability begins with restraint

One of the things I find interesting about sustainability is that we often associate it with adding something: a new green product, a new technology, a certified material or a more efficient system. But sometimes the most sustainable decision is actually to do less. Maybe the existing ceiling does not need to come down. Maybe the carpet tiles can be selectively replaced rather than removed completely. Maybe the doors can be refinished, the reception desk modified, some of the existing furniture reupholstered, the partition system reconfigured or the lighting upgraded rather than thrown away.

Those decisions are not particularly dramatic and they may never become the thing everyone notices in the final photographs, but environmentally they can be extremely important. As designers, we naturally enjoy the idea of starting with a blank sheet. Creatively that makes sense, but buildings are rarely blank sheets. There is already material there, labour there, energy embodied in those materials and money sitting in that space. Perhaps we need to become better at seeing those things as resources before we see them as demolition.

We also need to talk about what happens after the photograph

There is another slightly uncomfortable question I think our profession should ask. If an interior looks fantastic when it is completed, photographs beautifully and wins praise, but five years later most of it is ripped out and taken to landfill, was it really good design or was it simply good styling? There is a difference. A good interior should not only perform on completion day; it should perform over time. It should be maintainable, adaptable and capable of absorbing change without requiring another complete demolition exercise.

Can damaged parts be replaced without dismantling everything else? Can the space accommodate another tenant? Can furniture be rearranged? Can the company grow without immediately rebuilding? Can components be dismantled and reused somewhere else? These questions matter because change is inevitable. Businesses change, technology changes, ways of working change and tenants change. Yet sometimes we still design interiors as though they are never going to move again.

I think one of the biggest opportunities for sustainable interior design is simply to design for that reality. Demountable partitions make sense because layouts change. Modular furniture makes sense because teams change. Accessible services make sense because technology changes. Replaceable components make sense because things wear out. This is what makes circular design interesting to me. It is not simply an abstract environmental idea; it is a practical question: can what we are designing today have another life tomorrow?

Specification is where designers have enormous influence

Interior designers are significant specifiers, and that gives us more influence over sustainability than we sometimes realise. Every time we put a material on a drawing or specification, we are making several decisions at once. We are influencing how much material enters the project, where it comes from, how it is installed, how it is maintained, how long it might last and eventually how difficult it will be to remove, reuse, recycle or dispose of.

Traditionally, we might ask whether a material looks right, whether it is within budget and whether it is available. Those are still important questions, but I think the conversation needs to become broader. How long is it expected to last? Can it be repaired? Can individual parts be replaced? Does it need adhesives or fixing methods that make future recovery difficult? Can it be dismantled? What does it contribute to indoor air quality? Is there an equivalent that can be sourced closer to the project? How much waste does its installation create, what kind of maintenance does it need and what happens when it reaches the end of its useful life? Those questions belong in our profession. They are not somebody else's questions.

Sustainability is also about health, durability and context

Sometimes when we speak about sustainability, the conversation becomes almost entirely about carbon, energy and waste. But interiors are ultimately occupied by people, and people spend a huge part of their lives inside buildings. Paints, adhesives, boards, fabrics, carpets, sealants, furniture, composite materials and finishes all become part of the environment people breathe, touch and live with every day. So indoor air quality, ventilation, chemical content, dust, moisture resistance, cleaning and maintenance should also be part of sustainable interior design, particularly in healthcare spaces, laboratories, schools, workplaces and hospitality environments where people may spend long periods indoors.

There is also something very sustainable about choosing things that simply last. A material that performs properly for fifteen years is doing something very different environmentally from one that has to be replaced after three. Of course, durability does not mean choosing the hardest or most expensive material everywhere; it means specifying appropriately. A hospital corridor is not a private office, a hotel on the Kenyan coast does not expose materials to the same conditions as an office in Nairobi, and a laboratory does not have the same cleaning requirements as a boardroom. Sustainable specification needs context.

If we choose the wrong material and it fails early, the environmental cost is bigger than the replacement material itself. There is the removal, the waste, the transport, the new manufacturing, the new installation and the disruption. Good specification can prevent a lot of that, which is where sustainability and good professional practice start becoming almost the same conversation.

We should talk more seriously about local materials and the supply chain

I think sustainability should make us much more curious about our local supply chains. Not because everything manufactured locally is automatically sustainable, and not because every imported product is automatically bad. The conversation is more nuanced than that. But designers should at least ask what can be sourced locally, who manufactures it, what level of quality they can produce, whether it can be maintained here, whether spare parts are available, whether somebody can repair it five years from now and what local skills could become part of the design solution.

Kenya has an opportunity to build a much stronger ecosystem around sustainable interiors, but it will require designers, manufacturers, contractors and suppliers to talk to one another differently and earlier. The relationship between suppliers and designers should not just be: how do we get our product specified? Bring us knowledge. Tell us what the product is made from, where it comes from, how it performs, where it should and should not be used, what maintenance it needs, whether parts can be replaced and what happens to it at the end of its life. The best suppliers do not simply sell products; they help designers make better decisions.

Sustainability and cost do not have to fight each other

One reason sustainability sometimes gets pushed aside is the assumption that it automatically means spending more money. Sometimes it does; certain materials or technologies may carry a higher upfront cost. But sustainability is much bigger than buying expensive green products. Keeping an existing ceiling can save money. Reusing furniture can save money. Reducing unnecessary finishes can save money. Designing simpler details can save money. Reducing demolition can save money. Specifying durable materials can reduce future replacement costs, and designing flexible workplaces can reduce the cost of the next refurbishment.

Sometimes the sustainable answer is simply to use less. So rather than looking only at purchase price, perhaps the better question is value over time. How much will this material cost to maintain? How often will it need replacing? How disruptive will that replacement be? Can it serve another purpose later? Can the organisation take it with them if they move? The cheapest option today is not necessarily the cheapest decision over the life of the space. Commercial discipline and sustainability are not always opponents; very often they support each other.

Certification matters, but sustainability has to go further

Green building frameworks have done a lot of good for our industry. They give us standards, help make sustainability measurable, introduce accountability and force us to think about issues that might otherwise be overlooked. But I do not think sustainable design should only happen when a project is pursuing certification. A small office refurbishment may never seek a green building certificate, but it can still retain existing materials. A restaurant can still buy durable furniture. A hotel can still specify maintainable materials. A clinic can still prioritise healthier interior products, and an office can still use demountable partitions.

The bigger opportunity is for sustainability to become part of normal professional judgement: something we consider because that is simply what good design requires. Projects will always have budgets, programmes, availability constraints and competing priorities, and we will not always have perfect answers. But designers can still ask better questions: do we really need to demolish this, can we reuse it, can we use less material, can this product last longer, can it be repaired, can it be sourced closer to the project, can the system adapt and what happens when this material reaches the end of its useful life?

I think the profession needs to own this conversation

Interior designers already influence whether spaces are durable or disposable, whether they are adaptable or rigid, whether materials are retained or demolished, whether interiors support people's health and whether products remain useful for years or become waste after the next refurbishment. We already have the influence. The opportunity is to become much more intentional about how we use it.

Sustainability should appear in our briefs, influence our demolition drawings, come into material conversations, shape specifications, influence procurement and become part of our conversations with manufacturers and contractors. Ultimately, it should also affect how we judge whether a project has actually succeeded. At Curzey, we increasingly believe that good interior design has to bring together aesthetics, function, technical performance, commercial viability and environmental responsibility.

So maybe the question is no longer simply whether a space looks good. We should also be asking whether we used what was already there intelligently, whether what we added will last, whether the space can adapt, whether it is healthy for the people using it and what happens to everything we specified when the interior eventually changes again. We may not always have perfect answers, but these questions need to become normal. Interior designers have a much bigger role in the sustainability conversation than we sometimes give ourselves credit for. I think it is time we owned it.