MARY HANSEN DESIGN

THE GOOD: I think Mary is a competent designer. She has a nice personality, was well prepared for appointments, and was as on-time for appointments as one can expect given the traffic in the Puget Sound area. We liked the color palette that she recommended. THE BAD: One would think that one of the first questions that a designer would ask is, "What's your budget?". This didn't happen so on two different occasions I asked if $30K was a reasonable estimate for a remodel. I never got a straight answer from her, which should have been our clue to cut our losses and run. Mary and the contractor that she works with provided an estimate to us of $60k - twice our stated budget. Instead of leading us to reasonably-priced materials, she tried to lead us to very expensive materials that she liked; for example, one 8-inch wall sconce was estimated at $450. She also bid $800-$1200 for a design that she ultimately charged $2275 for, and did not inform us that we were exceeding her estimate. That amount included time that Mary, my wife, and I spent shopping for items (with no prices shown on the items) that turned out to be way too expensive; a waste of our time and money. At this point we cut ties with Mary. We ended up going with a different contractor. His labor and contractor markup came to $14K, and he was able to provide materials at far less cost than what Mary quoted. About the only thing that we used from Mary's design was the vanity design, which we implemented for nearly 1/3rd Mary's cost using decent quality modular cabinets and a remnant granite slab for a counter top. The total cost of our remodel came to about $29K, sales tax included, and we are very pleased with the results. SUMMING UP: We were expecting Mary to guide us to a design, materials, and a contractor labor estimate that was close to our budget but her estimate came in at twice our budget. If your design needs are small, say, a one or two hour color consultation, or if you are fortunate enough that price is not a big concern, then I can recommend Mary. Otherwise, you need some way to control Mary's labor cost - perhaps negotiate a fixed-price contract with specific deliverables - as well as a way to keep tabs on total project cost. Do not hire her by the hour for a large project. P.S. As of August 2014 Mary had not embraced computer-aided design which adds to her fees. I used Sweet Home 3D (free) and did a digital design that was very helpful in quickly modelling different design ideas and visualizing space utilization.

Mary Hansen was referred by a friend; we had no other information on her or her company. We liked how our friend's home had turned out and she mentioned Mary's help. We contacted Mary and she met with us, at our home, at a time of our convenience. Mary brought excellent examples, drew up complete and clear illustrations, and followed through on her commitments and promises. We just completed this phase of the remodel and are 100% satisfied with the result. Far above and beyond what we asked for or were charged for, Mary was generous with her advice and designs in other areas. We are now using these on the next phase of the project. We will definitely call Mary Hansen Design again.

MY WIFE LOVES WORKING WITH MARY. SHE'S UNPRETENTIOUS AND FUN. SHE DOESN'T TAKE OVER, INSTEAD WORKING WITH THE FURNITURE, ETC, THAT YOU ALREADY HAVE. HER COLOR CHOICES ARE SURPRISING, BUT THEY WORK.