It may seem counterintuitive for a designer, given the highly personal nature of the profession, but Robert Couturier jumps at the chance to have his friends as clients. “I cannot work for someone I do not get along with, and I absolutely welcome and love the idea of working with very close friends,” he says. Couturier, who has a staff of 15 at his New York firm, is adamant that, regardless of their relationship with a designer, clients must have complete confidence in whomever they hire. “Sometimes clients choose designers based on their social appeal, not their own inclination. It would be the same as buying a garment because it is fashionable and not because it fits you.”

The designer, who cites Jean-Michel Frank’s 1930s Paris apartment for the Vicomte de Noailles as one of his favorite interiors, has seen his stress level increase as new technologies change his field. “Less and less time is spent drawing and sketching,” he notes. Now his projects, which currently range from houses in Biarritz and Florida to two apartments and a house in Manhattan, “get done, creatively, that is, incredibly fast.” With change in the field occurring at a such a rapid pace, Couturier believes that it’s nearly impossible to predict the profession’s future, suggesting that “80 percent of what will be for sale in five years has not been invented yet, so we cannot even conceive of what will be coming up within a very short while.”

Robert Couturier

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