#awinewith Kelly Donougher: from mining to interior design and a life that didn't follow the plan
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How do you build the business, and the life, you're meant for when the one you planned falls through? Kelly Donougher is the founder of 13 Interiors, an interior design studio spanning Perth and Melbourne, and the author of No Fence, No Limits, the story of the fertility journey that rerouted her whole life. In this episode she talks forever homes, virtual reality design, why a physical studio still matters, and the moment she decided to build a life for herself instead of the one everyone expected.
What does an interior designer actually do for your forever home?
Kelly's specialty is the forever home: start-to-finish projects where every decision is about longevity, functionality and the life the owners are still growing into. Her team designs almost everything in 3D, and for bigger projects clients put on VR goggles and walk through their unbuilt home. "As much as 3D shows the reality of what a home can look like completed, virtual reality is that next step, immersing yourself in it." And because a forever home means two emotionally invested people making long-term decisions together: "Sometimes we're like marriage counsellors as well."
Is a physical studio worth it in a Zoom world?
Kelly runs two: the original Joondalup studio and warehouse in Perth (which she and her husband bought, a long-term investment regardless of what business sits in it), and a St Kilda studio in Melbourne on a lease she negotiated so well that "a consult a week pays for that space." The Melbourne base also solves a very WA problem: most design brands barely invest west of the Nullarbor, so having a foothold on the east coast means her team can physically vet furniture and finishes that Perth clients would otherwise only ever see online. "I physically sat on your couch, and it's amazing" is a sentence that closes deals.
How do you rebuild when life doesn't follow the plan?
Kelly and her husband moved from Sydney to Perth for a three-year mining reset that became twelve. When another round of fertility treatment made it clear that chapter wasn't going to end the way they'd hoped, she faced a decision most women will recognise in some form: "There's definitely pivotal moments where you get to a point and you're like, I have to actually make a decision about what it is that I want to do with my life." She started studying interior design purely because she loved it, with no plan for it to become anything. It became 13 Interiors.
Why write the hard book?
No Fence, No Limits is Kelly's account of growing up with a picture of how life would go, the white picket fence and the kids, and what happens to you when it goes another way: the taboo of fertility struggles, the stages of grief, and the acceptance on the other side. Her story doesn't end with children, and that's exactly why she wrote it. "Just because my world is different to your world, it doesn't mean that it's wrong. Amazing things can still eventuate out of opportunities, because that first thing didn't happen." It's the book she needed when everyone else's story resolved differently to hers.
Kelly's one piece of advice for women in business
"You don't need to be everything to everyone. You just need to be everything to your ideal client." It's the line Kelly teaches in her workshops and mentoring, and the antidote to the overwhelm of trying to serve everybody: pick your person, and be exceptional for them.
Meet Kelly Donougher, Founder of 13 Interiors
Kelly Donougher is the founder and director of 13 Interiors, an interior design business specialising in residential forever homes and commercial projects, with studios in Joondalup (Perth) and St Kilda (Melbourne). A former mining professional turned designer, she also presents workshops, speaks, mentors designers, and is the author of No Fence, No Limits, available through her website, Amazon and Booktopia.
You can find her here:
Full transcript
Danielle: So good! Kelly, welcome to Spark TV!
Kelly: Thank you, very excited, and thank you for having me.
Danielle: Oh my gosh, I'm excited to have you on the podcast and share your story. So let's just dive straight in, and tell everyone who you are and what you do.
Kelly: Well, how long do we have?
Danielle: We'll get a bottle of wine.
Kelly: I think so. So my name is Kelly Donougher. I am the director and founder of 13 Interiors, which is an interior design business. We specialise in residential and commercial as well, and we have studios in Perth and Melbourne, which is super exciting, so I get to travel across the country and work with lots of different clients with my team. I also love presenting workshops and speaking events, and I've just written a book as well, which is called No Fence, No Limits, which is super exciting.
Danielle: Oh my god, there's a lot to talk about there. So let's start out with the interior design business. What kind of clients, what kind of work do you work on? When would somebody come to you?
Kelly: We specialise in the forever home, so I love the journey of working with clients on their long-term decisions. They could be a couple, they might be a family, but we're really looking at their long-term future, and making decisions about the longevity of their home, the functionality, and the practicality for the future. I love that kind of design. I love start-to-finish projects, so often we work with clients that might be at the new build stage, and we work with them right through to furnishing and styling at the very end. We might work on renovations with clients, and we also do commercial projects as well. So very much about long-term decisions when it comes to practicality and functionality and those long-term homes.
Danielle: Oh, I think that's gorgeous. So, you'll probably hate this, but I'm mid-season of The Block right now. Is it as dramatic as it looks?
Kelly: Look, I think the media beats up a lot about the dynamics of the couples to really try and fish for viewer attention. The reality of building and renovating in that environment is obviously super quick, and that is not the way the real world works. But they are also very limited in the products and the brands that they can use, it's all organised prior, so they have access to particular products. That's why I do feel for them sometimes when they get slammed by the judges for choices, because they don't actually get a lot of choice. So it's not like the real world at all.
Danielle: I know. I actually think it's put me off renovating. I watch it and I'm like, I don't think I could deal with it. I would just say, come to someone like you and say, could you just make my fantasy happen and take care of everything? I will not be participating in this.
Kelly: That's why we love 3D design. Pretty much everything we do, to be honest, is 3D, so we're showing a client exactly what their home is going to look like before it's actually renovated. And we also use virtual reality programs for those larger-scale projects, where they can immerse themselves, walk through, wear the goggles.
Danielle: Oh my god, that's cool!
Kelly: That's really fun, that's been a new introduction, and it's been really well received. I think it's quite captivating for the client as well, because as much as 3D shows the reality of what a home can look like completed, virtual reality is that next step, immersing yourself in it. And when you put those goggles on, it really is a different feeling.
Danielle: Yeah, and I think that's an interesting point too. A home kind of is about the feeling, isn't it? People often talk about that when they buy a house, they just step in and, this is it, this is it. You just have that immediate "I want to live here" moment. And it is difficult, not everyone is a visual, creative kind of person. So when you talk about designing or building a forever home, I feel like that's a huge responsibility, going, oh my god, how do I pick something that I'm supposed to love for the rest of my life if you're not creative or visual? Something like that virtual reality just makes so much sense, helping people get to that point and being comfortable with the decisions that they're making.
Kelly: It really is, because people get, obviously, emotionally invested. And decisions when you're emotionally charged, and you've often got two decision-makers to take into account, both partners in most situations, it can be really overwhelming. So it's up to us to really work with those clients, delve into what their needs are, what their wants are, make sure both people are heard. So sometimes we're like marriage counsellors as well.
Danielle: Oh my god, I love it. And so now, you mentioned you've got the two studios. What does that mean your team looks like?
Kelly: So we have 3 designers on the team, and they're all in Perth, because that's where we originated, with the first studio in Joondalup. But they have the opportunity to come to Melbourne as well, depending on the type of projects we're working on and whether they need to be in Melbourne for meetings. And I also like to have them in Melbourne for particular events, for further development, events for our industry like Design Week and Decor + Design, where they can come and learn, and also meet our suppliers. There's a lot on the East Coast that's not available to Perth, so for us, it's a really great opportunity for our Perth clients, because we can physically see so much more in person, and really vet what we are choosing and selecting for our clients, making sure it is the right fit. A lot of people have to look at things online, and they just don't have the luxury of seeing that physical item. So we have that advantage now, too.
Danielle: That's really interesting. I always think that about Perth. I'm over in WA, but I'm from the East Coast, so I've always thought, WA is like its own little country. Why don't they have access to all of the stuff that the East Coast people do? I just think it's actually ripe for opportunity.
Kelly: You're exactly right in saying that. It's a huge opportunity. I think a lot of things come down to freight and shipping costs, and a lot of the brands originate on the East Coast, so the head office is Sydney or Melbourne. They might have a little subsidiary over here, or a distributor, and then they just don't want to invest the money in having a solid base in WA. Maybe some brands just don't see it worth the investment. It's something that has been really challenging for our industry for such a long time, so it's been really great to now have the base over here, widen our circle of who we get to work with and what we get to see. And then it allows us to give that back to the client, to say, hey, I physically sat on your couch, and it's amazing. Or get more samples, or send them videos. It's been a really good opportunity to further improve our client experience.
Danielle: Wow, I love that. And when you say you have the studio, do you actually have physical space that clients can come into?
Kelly: Yeah, physical space. So the Joondalup space has the studio where the team works, and we also have our warehouse attached, which is great, because when we're doing furniture curation, all that stuff comes to us first. We vet it all, we check it, and then we plan our installs with the clients. That's about 200 square metres. And then in Melbourne, we have our studio in St Kilda, which is a smaller space, but staff can work in that space, and I also have the meeting area, where clients can come in, and we have the presentation space to put their designs on the TV and work through that. And suppliers can also come in. It's been wonderful to have those two locations and see our clients face-to-face. We just found the East Coast were getting tired of Zoom, really, and I was as well. I wanted that bespoke and boutique experience for our East Coast people.
Danielle: Yeah. But also, I would say, challenging. From a business point of view, what's it been like to operate a business that requires physical space and inventory? Because that's quite an overhead, right?
Kelly: Yeah, it's a cost. I think the Perth building was a different setup, because we bought that building, so that is a long-term investment for my husband and I. From that perspective, it doesn't matter what's in that space.
Danielle: Smart.
Kelly: So that was definitely not a leasing decision. The building I got in St Kilda is a lease, but I negotiated a really good lease, and financially, it's like a consult a week pays for that space. I was super lucky with securing that building, and knowing that it's actually not a huge overhead for us and it's not costing the business money. I'm making that money back in the sense of the service that we're now providing those clients.
Danielle: Yeah, and I would assume that's really valuable to someone, having the opportunity to come in and meet you. As we said, it's an emotional decision, a long-term decision. You want to know that you're investing in the right person, and as much as technology is amazing and we have Zoom, I can imagine that would be really important for people, to come in and meet you and see things in the flesh.
Kelly: It's time investment with them. Sometimes we are at people's homes as well, if they're renovating, we're obviously going to them. But it's the representation of the business, it's that brand awareness, it's creating an environment where they feel valued, and they're working with a reputable brand.
Danielle: I love that. So how long have you been in business now?
Kelly: Just over… nearly 8 years? I feel like it goes so fast. 2017, I first registered my business, but I was working in mining for quite a few years before I leapt over full-time.
Danielle: Sounds like WA, yes! Oh, how good. So if you were in mining, how did we get from mining to interiors?
Kelly: Yeah, well, I talk all about that in my book as well.
Danielle: That's a good segue.
Kelly: The mining life was a bit of a reset. We'd moved from Sydney, hustle and bustle over there, and a long journey of fertility struggles and those types of things, living in the rat race of Sydney, driving here, there and everywhere, working in jobs that we'd both had for a really long time. Then we had the opportunity to move to Perth and start roles in mining, and we thought, hey, why don't we go for 3 years, experience something different, experience the other side of the country, have a lifestyle reset, see what happens. And that actually eventuated into 12 years.
Danielle: Wow.
Kelly: I know! A classic case of, let's do something different, and then it all changes again, which is very standard for us. But it was such an amazing experience. We loved Perth, we loved the lifestyle, we'd go up to Ningaloo Reef and Exmouth, we'd go down to Margaret River, and we had all this time because we were on these roster scenarios. We weren't working 24-7. So that was a really nice experience, to have that reset. And then we came to the point where we decided to try the fertility treatments again, and got to the point where it just really wasn't working for us anymore. This was just not going to happen. And I had to make that conscious decision about what my life was going to be, and where that path was going to take me. And I think this can happen to a lot of women as well, whether you have children or not, whether you're looking at a career change: there's definitely pivotal moments where you get to a point and you're like, I have to actually make a decision about what it is that I want to do with my life. I really had to make that decision. And I'd always loved design. A lot of my family and friends had always said to me, you're really amazing at what you do, styling my homes and things like that. And I'd always really loved it. So I started studying interior design for me, because it was something that I really loved. I never envisaged it was going to become what it has now. But it really took off, and the rest is history, really, when it comes to 13 Interiors.
Danielle: Oh my god, you know, you're the second person that I've spoken to today about that moment in life where… oh, I love visitors, hello? Who is this?
Kelly: Sorry, that's my dog!
Danielle: I love that, that's so cute! No, you're the second person today I've spoken to about that moment in life where you realise you need to actually do something that you're passionate about, and get obsessed with, and that you want to work on. So that's so interesting that you had that moment of, I'm gonna do this for me. And so cool that exploring something that you actually love, that's the thing that took off.
Kelly: Yeah, and I had no concept that it was really going to turn into that. I just knew that it was something I really enjoyed. When I got into the studying, and I started doing the assignments, I was excited to do an assignment. Who says that when they're studying? It was just a really different experience after all the years of working for someone else, fixing their systems and their processes and looking after their staff. It really became about something that I didn't know existed within me, and it really was a total life reset.
Danielle: Wow, I love this so much. So it sounds like the book is something similar to this. What's the book on?
Kelly: So the book is called No Fence, No Limits, and it really is about my life story of the fertility treatments, and really, growing up expecting your life to be one way, and then it going a completely different way. Sorry, my dog again! As we grow up, I think we have these expectations around what our life is going to be, and I think everyone can relate to this. You think you're going down one path, and you grow up, and you get married, and you think you're going to have kids, and the white picket fence. And what happens when life doesn't translate that way? Where does it leave you? The societal expectations, and the comparisons that we go through, seeing what friends and family might be doing. My book talks about that whole journey of those expectations that I had on myself, that I think my family probably expected of me as well, and friends, and that environment that you grow up with. And then when your life goes a different path, what does that ultimately do to you and your mental health? I share the journey of the fertility struggles, the unknown path to starting my business, and then the eventuation of realising that I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. And sometimes the cards you get dealt are the cards that you are meant to be dealt. There's no amount of trying to change that path. You are where you're supposed to be. And I share that in the book, and I talk about the adversity, but knowing that sometimes out of the crappiest times, amazing things can still happen. You might not know what's at the end of that tunnel, or you haven't really seen the light yet, but sometimes you just need to hang on.
Danielle: As you're talking, I'm thinking about all of the people listening who are having that moment right now. Because I also think it can happen again and again, where you go, oh, maybe this is the thing, oh, maybe this is the thing. We're continually going through those feelings. Obviously you have the benefit of hindsight, and you've gone through something that's horrific, but you've landed in this spot and pursued this dream, and it's obviously working out. But do you have any advice for when you're in those moments? You said sometimes you've just got to hang on, but is there anything that helped you get through?
Kelly: I think I had some really good friends and a strong family base that was very supportive. There are definitely coping mechanisms that everyone has that are different. I'm very much that person that needs a goal to work towards. I don't work well in pity environments. I need to know that, okay, this has happened, this is where I need to be, and this is my goal. I'm quite structured like that. I've realised I actually do like change, and change is very much something that is good for me, where it's not for everyone. But support networks, I think, are really important, friends and family that can just listen. I think it's really hard in those times of adversity when you have a lot of people around you, and they might say things that are a little bit insensitive without realising, because they've never really experienced what you're going through, whether it is fertility or something else, challenging times, deaths in family. Often you just need people to listen. It might be just that friend that has a really good listening ear that you can confide in, but they don't need to fill the air with their voice, they listen to yours. And I think that can be something that's super supportive, and it definitely was for me in certain situations. And I think it's working through those stages of grief. My book talks a lot about denial, grief, depression, it talks about the acceptance, and then going, okay, well, this is where I'm at, what am I going to do with that? It can be really challenging, and it can be a lot of things that add up together to change the result. But often the biggest thing can just be knowing that there is more for you. And that was, for me, going: there is something else out there for me, and I know it.
Danielle: And I think that is the most beautiful reason why your book now exists. When you're going through this alone, and you're isolated, and you're going, oh my god, how did I get here, or why isn't this happening? Being able to read a book like this and hear about your experience and know that there's hope, I think that is such a beautiful reason to have this book exist in the world. To be that beacon of hope if somebody is sitting there going, what the hell? How amazing.
Kelly: Thank you. I really hope that it is that beacon of hope for people, and that is exactly why I wrote it. When I was going through this chapter in life, and also starting to write this book, a lot of journeys that you hear about, or experiences that people have had, are that they go through these really shitty times, and they do have children at the end. That wasn't my story. But I want people to know that just because I didn't have children, and my world is different to your world, it doesn't mean that it's wrong. Amazing things can still eventuate out of opportunities, because that first thing didn't happen. I just hope that it's a beacon of light for people when they read it, to know that whatever they're going through, just because their first idea of what they thought their life was going to look like didn't happen, doesn't mean that the way it ends up is wrong.
Danielle: What was it like actually writing those words on paper? Writing a book about something that was so emotional and a personal experience?
Kelly: It was quite hard in the beginning. I didn't write it in the beginning for it to be published. It was quite a long time ago when I started it, and it was more a process of getting things on paper, a cathartic experience of pen to paper and writing things out, almost journaling a little bit. Then I started to see that maybe this could be an opportunity for someone else, and I was really hoping that if I did explore this and maybe publish it one day, it was there to help somebody else. As I got a little bit further along, my husband and I would talk about it, because we were very private about our journey too. This impacted him deeply as well, and he was very private about the situation. And I just felt like it was such a taboo topic, and I really wanted people to know that it's okay to talk about things like this, and your feelings. The initial journey of it was quite hard. As I got towards the end, and started really capturing how 13 Interiors started, and how life has eventuated now, I was almost excited about it, because I was like, no, this is going to be great for somebody else. And I hope that they pick it up and walk away with just that little bit of light, going, nope, there's more for me.
Danielle: Wow, that's incredible. I love that. I'm always fascinated by books. I have a wall of books, and I'm forever writing books in my brain and not always getting them on paper. There's just something so romantic about the physical, we just talked about that with interiors, right? There is something so powerful about the physical. Having a real-life book, in this digital world that we live in, is always so fascinating to me. Did you get a publisher, or self-publish?
Kelly: So I went with Dean Publishing, and they have been super amazing. I've had such an amazing experience with them. I think I was one of the fastest published books this year. We started together in March or something, but I'd obviously pre-written the book at that point, and then worked with their editing team on the structure, and the name, and the format of it. It's been a really amazing experience, so supportive. Definitely recommend the publishing journey.
Danielle: Oh my god, that is so good. And does that mean, if you've published through them, it should be pretty much available anywhere if anyone wants to pick it up?
Kelly: That's right, yeah. It's on my website, and it's available online through Amazon, Booktopia, and all those places as well, and through local bookstores, and obviously my website, for the local people to support too.
Danielle: Oh my god, I love it. I could talk to you all day, Kelly. But I always love to wrap up these podcasts with one last piece of advice. So, reflecting on your time in business, what would be a piece of advice that you would give to another woman on her business journey?
Kelly: My favourite quote is: you don't need to be everything to everyone, you just need to be everything to your ideal client. I always talk about that in my workshops, in my mentoring, when I coach design clients. I think it's something we can get overwhelmed with, feeling like we have to be everything to everyone, but we don't. We just have to be that ideal person to that ideal client. And that's the most important thing.
Danielle: Oh, I absolutely love it. Kelly, you are amazing. Thank you so much for being here and sharing your story and your wisdom. I know so many people listening in would have gotten so much out of that, so, so grateful for your time.
Kelly: Thank you so much, I really appreciate it.
