How do you choose the right projects for your portfolio?

1 Know your audience

Before you start selecting and organizing your projects, you need to know who you are designing your portfolio for. Are you targeting a specific niche, such as hospitality, retail, or office design? Are you looking for a job at a certain firm, or are you trying to attract your own clients? Depending on your goals, you will want to tailor your portfolio to highlight the projects that are most relevant, impressive, and aligned with your audience's needs and expectations. For example, if you are applying for a job at a hotel design firm, you will want to showcase your hospitality projects and emphasize your skills in creating inviting, functional, and memorable spaces for guests.

2 Showcase your range

While it is important to focus on your specialty and niche, you also want to show your versatility and creativity as a commercial interior designer. You don't want to have a portfolio that looks too repetitive, predictable, or boring. You want to demonstrate that you can handle different types of projects, clients, and challenges, and that you can adapt your style and approach to different contexts and requirements. To do this, you can include a variety of projects that showcase different scales, budgets, styles, functions, and outcomes. For example, you can include a large-scale corporate office project, a small-scale boutique store project, and a medium-scale restaurant project, and show how you applied different design elements, strategies, and solutions to each one.

3 Highlight your process

Another key aspect of choosing the right projects for your portfolio is to highlight your process and your value as a commercial interior designer. You don't want to just show the final results of your projects, but also the steps and decisions that led to them. You want to show how you collaborate with clients, stakeholders, and contractors, how you research and analyze the site and the market, how you develop and refine your concepts and sketches, how you select and source materials and furniture, how you create and present your drawings and renderings, and how you supervise and manage the construction and installation. By showing your process, you can showcase your skills, expertise, and professionalism, and also tell a story that engages and convinces your audience.

4 Use quality images

One of the most important factors that can make or break your portfolio is the quality of your images. You want to use high-resolution, well-lit, and well-composed images that capture the essence and the details of your projects. You want to use images that show the context and the function of your spaces, as well as the mood and the style that you created. You also want to use images that highlight your design features, such as color, texture, lighting, furniture, and accessories. You can use a mix of professional photographs, 3D renderings, and sketches to show different perspectives and stages of your projects. You can also use annotations, captions, and labels to explain and emphasize your design choices and solutions.

5 Organize your layout

The last tip for choosing the right projects for your portfolio is to organize your layout in a clear, coherent, and attractive way. You want to create a portfolio that is easy to navigate, read, and understand, and that showcases your projects in the best possible way. You can use a simple and consistent format, such as a grid or a booklet, to display your projects, and use headings, subheadings, and dividers to separate and categorize them. You can also use a color scheme, a font style, and a logo to create a visual identity and a brand for your portfolio. You can also use a cover page, a table of contents, an introduction, and a contact page to introduce yourself and your portfolio to your audience.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?