Cross-Pollination and Culture-First Hiring Drive Fresh Hospitality Design at DyeLot Interiors
Key Highlights
- DyeLot Interiors promotes a culture of collaboration and personal connection, valuing diverse skills and backgrounds and prioritizing in-person interactions to enhance creativity and foster growth.
- Design approaches are rooted in deep research and understanding of client brand identities, using techniques like bridge branding to create emotionally resonant spaces.
- Knowledge sharing within the team and externally is encouraged to sustain innovative practices and strengthen relationships throughout the interior product supply chain and design community.
While visiting Hospitality Design (HD) Expo this past May in Las Vegas, i+s met up with DyeLot Interiors design manager and senior associate Krystle Fader, NCIDQ, CID, and senior interior project designer Adam Ford, NCIDQ. The conversation revealed how the firm’s collaborative, supportive culture reinforces the entire team’s ability to connect brand identities with spatial experiences designed to achieve immersive storytelling without becoming formulaic.
i+s: What can you tell us about the culture of DyeLot Interiors? I’m intrigued by the mix of branding and procurement specialists, architects, and interior designers.
Krystle Fader: What’s really unique about our firm is every person truly brings something different to the table, a different strength, and we can lean on each other. I’ve never worked in a place where we’ve had so much dynamic energy.
Adam Ford: Yes, the cross-pollination of typologies is helpful because we’re always trying to improve workflow or creativity. Maybe there is a process for one work group that’s really successful, or there’s something we do [in interior design] that pushes another group in a way that produces new solutions or ideas. In firms where it’s just hospitality-focused designers, for instance, that ability to cross-pollinate is not there.
i+s: Would you say DyeLot values a diverse skill set and different backgrounds when seeking new team members?
KF: Yes, when we’re looking for talent to build our team, it’s a dynamic process. We don’t just ask, “Are you good at this program? How long have you worked in the industry? You’re hired!”
There’s so much that goes into who we are as people. When I met with [principal] Jackson [Thilenius] for the first time, we didn’t talk about work at all. We talked about our kids and who we are. He got to know me on a personal level. Then later, of course, there was discussion about how long [I’d] been in the industry, what I was interested in.
We build the team around whether you’re a good culture fit for our company first. Then, does skill come along with that? What’s the experience? There’s a lot of digging into what you are passionate about—what are you leaning into?—and then tapping into that as a team.
i+s: It sounds like mentorship and career development would be prioritized. How do you see that unfolding with DyeLot?
KF: Meeting in person is still so important. Just before [the pandemic], we started using Microsoft Teams regularly; some people were already starting to work from home before COVID hit. Then we jumped into COVID, and everyone went remote.
But once we started trickling back into the office, we recognized how a lot of the more junior staff really wanted to be in person; they wanted that experience…to overhear conversations and be able to look over someone’s shoulder and get a quick idea. They want to feel like they’re part of something, they understand what’s going on, and they’re not just a cog in the wheel.
AF: So much of what we do is tangible. Say, when you look at a material online, then you get the sample, and they’re two drastically different things. The same applies to the creative process: You’re working on this rendering. You’ve got this beautiful design; then, when it comes down to documenting and making it real, there’s no constructability to it.
So, with mentorship, the opportunity’s there, whether planned or not, when we’re together. Having junior designers be able to just turn around and say, “Can you look at this and help me detail this one piece?” is something you can’t walk through remotely. Even going over and sketching with them, and showing the material sample and how it works—that’s one big part. Especially for the junior designers who finished their programs [during the pandemic], and for lack of a better term, were cheated of that in-person experience. I think they’re hungry for this return to work in a way.
KF: Another thing about mentorship—we tend to think of it more like coaching versus mentorship. We’re trying to avoid the idea that you need to be like your mentor, versus coaching somebody to develop what’s best for them or for the situation. It’s also not just our senior leadership having a one-on-one with somebody more junior. We’re all having one-on-ones to make those connections.
We can talk about personal things. You can talk about work. You can talk about expanding your career. And are you feeling stuck or drained? Are you working on stuff that’s just dragging you down? It’s an open forum.
i+s: Let’s talk about the work for a minute. How do you keep DyeLot’s design approach fresh, whether you’re working on a well-known brand or with a company who’s looking to establish their brand presence?
KF: Doing plenty of research and having lots of conversations with clients to understand their brand identity—who they are as a “host” and what their mission is with the space, the feeling they want to create. It applies whether that’s a hotelier, a community, or a commercial brand.
AF: One thing we do is called a bridge branding exercise. We look at everything—let’s say, in a hotel project—from the location to the booking experience to the welcome from the concierge. We want to understand what the entire spatial experience is—and what it could be—and how it fulfills that promise to the guest that the brand says it stands for. It’s all about context, not just about themes or colors.
KF: It doesn’t have to be a literal interpretation but more emotionally resonant and sensory. At a wine country venue we worked on, the Curio Napa, one design feature is a pixelated [mural] image that doesn’t immediately make you point and say, “That’s a vineyard,” but it provides that subconscious connection without being overt.
AF: Yes, and working in local perspective, culture, and references, especially with artwork, does a lot for branding and intentionally connecting the property to the geographic location.
i+s: Can you talk a bit about cultivating those local relationships?
AF: Establish relationships with local artisans and studios, and if you can keep them healthy and sustained, they’ll introduce you to people. That’s what’s great about this industry. People do move around in companies, so you might know someone that you used to work with at a different company. You can reach out to them and say, “I know you handle this type of work now. Do you have any local contacts who do this?”
KF: And circling back to that community aspect: Knowledge sharing is so critical, whether that’s within our own team or externally. If you find a good approach, or a great source for something, it’s important to share that. We shouldn’t be holding onto these things preciously, because everyone is going to benefit.
Learn more about DyeLot Interiors at dyelot.com.
