Designing A Remote Lifestyle
I have always loved traveling, but when Curtis and I got married, his love for travel only made mine stronger! We have a notebook where we write our personal and life goals down and from day one together, we wrote that we wanted to live and work remotely full time. In my mind this was a dream. At the time, both of us were working 9-5 jobs in Charlotte, NC. We were super happy, but the idea of traveling full time seemed far fetched at best.
About one year later, I was exposed to remote interior design for the first time and saw a new horizon for the design world. No longer did design have to cost you thousands of dollars and meeting with a designer in person was not the only way anymore. After a lot of long conversations and a lot of support from Curtis, I founded my business, Transparent Interiors.
In 2019 Curtis joined me and took the leap into fully remote work at a digital marketing agency, FENX Digital. We were living in Augusta, GA. We had bought a house & were running an Airbnb, we had a wonderful church and a great community, but we knew that if we were going to travel, now was the time. So in December 2019 we sold our home, packed up all our earthly possessions in a 10×10 storage unit, and in January we set off on our first remote trip in Buenos Aires, Argentina for 2 months. We figured that it was enough time to test out the waters to see if we liked the concept of extended travel. Spoiler alert: we loved it.
COVID definitely threw a wrench in our travel plans, but we are still loving the nomadic lifestyle. Since international travel has not been an option since we returned from Argentina we have taken the time to visit family and friends around the U.S while practicing staying in place, social distancing, etc..We are hoping to start our international travels back up again in the fall.
I often get asked if I miss having a home while designing permanent homes for other people. While I am not a cheesy quote person, I really believe this one is true: “home is where the heart is”. I have learned a lot about what I need to feel at home in a foreign country or place, but really I have learned that if you decide to love where you are, that can be home, even if it is just temporary. I have lived in Memphis, Birmingham, Charlotte, Fort Mill, and Buenos Aires now and all of those places have felt like home for one reason or another. Travel has always inspired my design process and I am looking forward to sharing more of that part of my life with you!
