It's been a few weeks since our newest designer to the team joined RODE, so we asked Caroline Jones to tell us how she came to be at RODE and what she's been up to since she started...

1. What appealed to you most about interior design that led to you becoming a designer?
My love of design has always been there--as a kid (and still) I played Tetris with my furniture and went to any open house I would see in my neighborhood. After working for a couple of years out of undergrad I felt creatively deprived and began taking evening intro to architecture courses at my local community college and the rest is history.

2. How did your career lead you to RODE?
Jess Haley was one of my studio professors while I was in graduate school at the BAC and then became my graduate thesis advisor, which is how RODE initially got on my radar. I began  following along with the projects RODE was involved in and was intrigued by the range of project types and sizes for a smaller firm. Once I knew there was a position open that I was qualified for I was all over it!

3. Is there a particular focus of interior design you are especially knowledgeable of, or interested in working on at RODE?
All of my professional work has been focused in residential design so I am especially excited to be working on future hotel and restaurant projects since that will be an entirely new experience!

4. When you aren’t at work making the world more beautiful, how do you spend your free time?
I love being outside--I have a 6 year old dog, Oakley, who I got of course because I love dogs and the companionship aspect, but I also wanted an adventure buddy who would get me outside on some of the less than ideal New England winter days. I hike and downhill ski, but with the pandemic and ski areas closing early I got into cross country skiing and Oakley loves it as much as I do!

5. In your opinion, what is one of the worst interior design trends you’ve seen in the industry (past or present)? What is one of the best (past or present)?

Not all accent walls are created equal! I feel like I am constantly trying to talk a friend out of painting one random wall a different color than the rest. I am really excited to see that bold patterns and color are again being used by the masses in both wallpaper and tile installation. Maybe we will be making fun of our choices in a couple of decades, but for now it's much more fun to be in a space that feels more lively.

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RODE's Caroline Jones recently gave the below speech  on site at 1515 Commonwealth Ave alongside our teammates Davis, Tocci, and more in celebration of Women in Construction Week. Pictured above, left to right: Caroline Jones, Amanda Sanders, Amanda Dexter.

Hi everyone, my name is Caroline Jones. I am an Interior Designer at RODE Architects and have been working on the 1515 project over the last two and a half years.

The first person to introduce me to the world of architecture and design was my father, a self-proclaimed architecture school dropout who had his own contracting business when I was a kid. He went on to have an entirely different second career, but much of his free time was spent working on our rambling old house. I would get pulled into helping, though not with design - my duties were largely limited to sweeping, peeling wallpaper, and (if I was lucky!) some painting. So before I was a woman in design and construction, I was a kid in construction.

I very much prefer to be outdoors, but growing up in New England it's unavoidable that we spend much of the winter months indoors. In part that's what drew me to interior design – if I have to spend so much time indoors, then it should feel good to be there! While I was in grad school I learned that the average person spends about 86% of their day indoors. Interior design certainly has a reputation of being somewhat frivolous, but this statistic helped me reframe the importance of the work I do. I want the space I am designing to be a comfortable, safe, and healthy environment for people to live, work, or simply have their lunch break. I want the end user’s experience to be as pleasant as it possibly can - and I feel grateful to work in an industry that involves so much cross-discipline collaboration with other women to make that happen.

As a designer I spend only a small amount of my time on job sites. Over the years I have relied heavily on subcontractors and installers to help educate me on how to improve as a designer: how to better communicate my designs and how to design more realistically and more economically. Since I'm not in the field building and installing what I have drawn, learning from those who are is important for my professional growth. To know that some of those doing that work are women is humbling.

Just as I have gained so much through collaborating with all of you, I also take my role as a mentor seriously. The interior design industry is majority female, making us the outliers in the building industry - but giving me the ability to provide an encouraging space for other women to explore the variety of opportunities that historically might not have been available to them.

I want to thank everyone in this room for being a part of today’s event and for supporting women in construction, both the ones in this room and those yet to come. And big thank you to Tocci and Davis for organizing today’s event!

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