Design Advice Worth Reading
Good design starts with good information. At Nubuor Designs, we share honest, process-driven advice on interior design, renovation planning, and furnishing your home well. All written from the perspective of a designer who has seen every phase of the process firsthand. Principal, Margaret Nubuor, brings an architecture background and over a decade of full-service residential design experience to every project and every post.
Having worked on historic brownstones, gut renovations, and full furnishing projects across Boston and beyond, the advice here comes from someone who has navigated the design process from every angle. From navigating contractor bids to understanding how designers work, our goal is simple: the more informed you are going into the process, the better you and your home will be coming out of it. Start with our series on navigating the contractor bidding process, or explore the full blog below.
What Is Pre-Construction and Why Does It Matter?
Most renovation timelines jump straight from contractor selection to breaking ground. What's missing in between is often the most valuable part of the entire process. Pre-construction is the phase where your design team and contractor sit down together before anyone touches a wall, align on exactly what's being built, and surface every conflict, question, and ambiguity while they're still cheap to resolve. It doesn't get talked about much. It should.
What to Ask a Contractor Before You Sign
Before you sign with a contractor, there are questions worth asking that most clients never think to raise until it's too late. Who's actually showing up to your home every day? How does this person handle surprises? What happens when something goes wrong after the project is done? The answers tell you a lot more than the bid ever will.
Why Your Designer Should Set Renovation Allowances
Most homeowners don't think about allowances until the bids come in. By then, the numbers have already been set by the contractor, and they're almost never realistic for the finish level you're actually expecting. Here's why that single decision quietly drives more budget surprises than almost anything else in a renovation, and what to do about it.
How to Read and Compare Contractor Bids
Contractor bids are confusing by nature. Every contractor formats them differently, uses different terminology, and makes different assumptions about what your project includes. By the time you line up the totals, you're often not comparing the same project at all. Here's how to actually read what you've been given and make a decision you can feel confident about.