For the first time in its 47-year history, the Design Board has selected two students to help refurbish an Indianapolis home.
Ball State University students, Raechel Ball and Katie Kane, received a $1,000 check from Carter-Lee Co. on Wednesday for their selection to the 2008 St. Margaret's Hospital Guild's Decorators' Show House and Gardens. The money will go toward buying decorations and supplies.
Ball, a junior interior design major, said she was excited for this opportunity because she could meet top designers in Indianapolis face to face and get her name out in the field.
"It's a competitive field, so anything you can do to get your name out and get an edge is awesome," she said.
Kane, a sophomore interior design major, said she agreed with Ball that it was a good way to get her name out in the field. She said it also was a way to show her talents and abilities to people who would not get to see them regularly.
Ball and Kane will refurbish "The Potting Shed" of an Italianate home, or having an Italian architectural style. They will work with about 40 professional designers who will be donating their own time and materials to refurbish the rest of the house.
Kane said they would take the existing, rundown potting shed and make it look like a mystic garden. She said she and Ball would use coppers, greens and blues. They also would place floor tiles.
"A lot of this stuff we've never done before such as putting in floor tiles, so we'll see how that goes," Kane said. "I think both of us have some people that are willing and able to help us, so we will have assistance."
Ball and Kane will start with the other designers Feb. 11 and will finish by mid-March.
Lydia Brunner, a member of the guild's promotion committee, said she introduced the idea of having student designers to the guild. She said she enjoyed watching home decorating shows and thought because they were popular, students might want to submit designs to win the Young Designer Award and help refurbish a house.
"We have generations of people who have been coming for years," she said, "but we wanted to attract the younger crowd and get college students involved."
She said the guild sent notifications about the competition in August to various Indiana colleges that had interior design programs. Ball and Kane were notified of their selection in November. She did not want to share how many students applied, but she said Ball State showed the most interest in the competition.
Ball said since she and Kane discovered they won they had been contacting Indianapolis companies to see if they would be willing to donate some of their items.
"We have a $1,000 allowance, but that can only go so far," she said.
If they do not use all the money, Ball and Kane said they would give the rest back to the guild.
Margaret's Guild is 100 years old and raises funds to support Wishard and the programs the hospital provides. The first decorators show house was in 1962 and is the guild's primary fundraiser.
Brunner said the guild refurbished houses mainly in the Meridian-Kessler area that were old and usually historic. The house Ball and Kane would work on was built in 1924, she said. It has five bedrooms, four bathrooms and a winter porch off the living room similar to a solarium. There also is an outdoor living room with a fireplace, outdoor kitchen, pool, pool house and gardens.
The family that lived in the house moved out at the end of December, Brunner said. They are both doctors and are living in another home they own not too far from the one being refurbished, she said. They are expected to move back the first part of May.
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