Not Ready? Do It Anyway with Kathryn O'Callaghan Mills

0:00So my ethos has always been just get your head down, you work hard, always just achieve and just striving to do a bit better. It just went from strength to strength. A, I've always wanted just to do well, but then B, it was why do you want that? And it was to help other women to have an easier journey. Our roles are to create environments that improve the day-to-day well-being of people within a workplace. Like that's our job. innovation is amazing and to be embraced but if you're designing for yourself you'll always be the concept designer rather than the design and build designer if you could say to yourself you don't have to be perfect in everything before you do it like just go for it and see what happens three years after we've started this podcast we thought it was time to make sure that those lessons and the takeaways from our amazing guests were actually actionable something you can really put into place.

0:59So we have launched a show notes, a bi-weekly email, get into your inbox, and that will give you the key headlines as indexable, findable, actionable. We can really start to make a difference in creating healthy, happy workspaces. So the link's below, or you can head to stansons.co.uk forward slash space. Look forward to seeing you sign up. Hello and welcome to another episode of Space by Stamson. Today, you're lucky to be hearing this because we've been trying to book it in for a year, probably. I'm with Catherine O 'Callaghan-Mills, the founder of Studio 7. Like literally so many things to talk about.

1:45I don't don't even quite know where we're going to start or where we're going to finish but she's had a massive history in design um from being on board level huge dmb firms and now her own um studio and what I mean just if you don't know Catherine I mean most people probably know you anyway it's great done loads of great work so it's an amazing story and I'm gonna sort of I said this actually just the other day I hate the word get under the skin yeah it's just a bit weird isn't it but I need to find another word because I keep saying it even on camera I don't like it but yeah I'm going to really sort of dig in and yeah just talk about where we are at and what's it with Studio 7 and everything so firstly welcome to the show Catherine thank you to the most patient man on earth thank you it's it's um I'm really looking forward to hearing it haven't planned anything but isn't that the best way we're supposed to be raw and the boring word authentic but just sensible good um so Catherine yeah you have founded Studio 7 when did that when did that drop wow it was um officially 1st of May 2025 so yeah nearly been running a year it's been so exciting just a real like I wasn't sure what to expect um didn't plan much did you not just just went for it um but unfortunately it's just it's been incredible just meeting new people exploring different businesses and um yeah and and also keeping my relationship alive with business past who I totally have the utmost respect for so it's been yeah it's been a really really great yeah yeah yeah it's a weird sitting up though anyway suddenly being a one person band yeah and i'm going from kind of i think it was about 13 years of directorship and and from that i mean like very traditional directorship where it's sitting on a board you're overseeing large teams and having to think consistently about um you know the well-being of people on workload on people making sure no one's getting burnout the financials that reflect all of that and investing in people and all of those things to then suddenly going I only have to think about little old me it was it was really weird I did feel a little bit lost at the beginning because as well when you're used to such a hustle and bustle every day to working in one's office it was it was quite quiet yes i can imagine but it does i said i'm sure i've said this part i've probably even said it it feels like 2025 2026 are the years of like design interior design white place design is obviously it's all i'd really know yeah going freelance yeah i've seen i've seen a massive thing massive shit yeah and and so successfully so successfully and the nice thing is that this little community that I feel like I'm only scratching the surface of is really welcoming you know people support each other give each other like opportunities which it's it's almost like a different outlook to the D &B mentality of our ship your ship we're versus each other the yeah the freelance community has been quite quite open arms yeah I haven't really thought about that but i haven't even seen it like because people post that i'm looking for someone to help and then i tie up the two and that's great like it really is and yeah like and the nice thing is is knowing so many people throughout kind of a 20 year span like my motto from the beginning was never like always always you know sounds a bit lame but always treat people how you expect to be treated and and be kind because you never know who you're going to meet on the way down and it's so true and it's been amazing because there's people literally from day one that I now freelance with like which is just after 20 years of knowing each other which is really lovely that is good and the background like talk to me a bit about um yeah your time and how you got in how did you even get into design did you do the study the whole yeah you do know it was um it was an interesting journey so my education from like we start very beginning it was very very traditional so you know you keep your head down work hard get your grades and get up get up the ladder i went to um centralst martin's because i pushed myself i was like go to best art school in london that was a phenomenal experience and just opened my eyes to everything got the degree and then went into the big wide world thinking interior design degree yes yeah so you always know you want to sorry now I got a I did a furniture and product design degree which is really right everyone has that reaction they go oh yeah that's interesting well it's I get it it's like yeah and I did I did like a sandwich course so in my third year I went and worked for two I did six months and six months into into residential interior design agencies and that was I mean one of them was bad shape bad shape bad crackers just crackers but such a massive eye-opener into the world of resi which I decided not to go into um and then yeah after graduating thought it would be easy you know just went for it and it wasn't so um I actually started I I knew about design and build hadn't done that much research I'm not gonna lie and I got offered a temping job as a receptionist in a design and build firm and they were they're a relatively small design and build firm it was only two weeks and after it was up I thought I'm just gonna I'm gonna go for it so I went and asked the MD and said oh this is my portfolio I actually would love to do what your design team do like could you give me a shot and fortunately for me that very kind gentleman said yeah we'll give you a shot so that's how the world of d &b started for me but it was really interesting because from that one moment you know i was why is the temp receptionist now sitting in our design studio how was that taken down with the design studio it wasn't easy to be to be perfectly honest and D &B was a very different time 20 years ago it was a lot more slapdash in a way just a lot less professional and resourceful is what we have now in in the big entities so it really was a case from that from that moment I just felt like I had to prove myself and prove your spot and your worth so my ethos has always been just get your head down you work hard you play hard as well like had the best time ever like 20s was just brilliant always just achieve and just yeah striving to do a bit better um and then yeah it just went from strength to strength so I started in D &B I went to traditional that was again super eye-opening had an amazing female director who just like I learned so much from her in the short time I was there and then knew I wanted to be back in D &B and so from that moment onwards it was it was full-on d &b just head down work hard and work your way up and what's it like being a female in that environment especially like 20 years or 15 years 10 years ago like how was that oh gosh um because just just give it to me because i'm sure it wasn't always easy no it was it wasn't easy and i think the sad thing is at the time you don't see yet you don't realize maybe the prejudice against you or the disparity of um male leads within businesses and I think that's actually why I yearned to go down the traditional route because it just seemed much fairer with with structure in place and I saw more women in directorship positions yeah from the beginning it was a fantastic experience but I think you were seen slightly I don't want to say is it like a secondary layer of but I didn't see many pioneering female leaders role models yeah role models at that time when I kind of flipped back from trad into d &b it was something that i i just had that fire in me that i just wanted a i've always wanted just just to do well it's the top so just in my bones from a young age and um but then b it was why do you want that and it was to help other women to have an easier journey I think and so I've been really passionate and I mean especially in the last 10 years about equality within D &B and how we can help just open more doors and just yeah encourage more young women to get into D &B it's come along strides it has gone strides but I would say it just feels slightly plateauing in the sense that when you do look at the top tier and you look at their board structures is still very very male dominated you know construction is a 75 % male dominated industry always will be I think from the from the sense of obviously you have the site side as well but yeah that was one of my one of my desires I think within a career is just to try and set an example and and don't get me wrong I saw I had some you know um leadership people going through my career that I thought well that's how I wouldn't want to do it but that's okay because you need to learn and listen and I think working for people that I found challenging to work for actually was brilliant because you learned that you have to be the one that has to adapt like is it a pain in the arse yes but are you the better like it the outcome will be better for you in the long run absolutely because yeah you just have to learn to adapt yeah i do find it strange though that women are as a demographic they are the greater in the design industry yeah from a designer's perspective you get more women designers than men yeah however it's such a male dominated space still yeah it's just funny yeah i know it is it is and when you go to fx or mix and it's predominantly designers There's probably like female tables there, which is amazing to see.

12:45But I think it still has this connotation and disparatory that if you want to be at the top or if you want to be a female PD or construction manager, you have to be slightly maybe aggressive. You have to really, you know, lack emotion, just be direct. And I just don't believe in that at all. I believe emotion is a good thing. Emotion is powerful. And there's a reason why we are genetically built differently. And if you had just one singular voice to run businesses, it would be so flat. You know, if you have no diversity and no disparate in age or gender or race, it's just one line. Yeah. So I - You miss a lot of tricks.

13:37yeah exactly exactly so what can we do well let's change the world now oh I mean I'm really big on like ageism as well genuinely because I was quite young when I went into a directorship position and it was a lot of things were said that I knew that would would you know slightly derogatory towards me and you know a young person can run a business like you know they are their minds are phenomenal like they're completely different minds to the mind of a 40 plus year old so it's it needs change from the top change from within and not PR change like true change so um I think I mean in my perspective you always learn from example so you need those role models and you need that person who fights for the equality or you know I had a mentor for from a young age who's absolutely phenomenal mind like incredible man and he he fought for equality and I do genuinely feel he had such a huge impact on me personally that I wouldn't have achieved what I achieved without his support because everyone needs someone to just you know cheerleader men and women yeah absolutely yeah yeah yeah exactly that I do agree like age is um is a big deal yeah and equality in gender as well it's like a big deal with such a sort of hungry roofless industry and the world's just sort of kind of speeding up I'm almost worried that we're gonna go backwards not to be negative but just in the push almost not having enough time like you sent your mentor put a lot into you that well would that still happen if they're so busy yeah yeah Yeah, I totally see your perspective.

15:26I guess as well, when I talk about equality, it's not to the detriment of men. I should have made that really clear, but I perceive equality as it's regardless of your gender, regardless of your age. And I do feel like, you know, flexible working, things like that. Our industry is renowned for it being a bit of a bad thing because the industry is so demanding and it's a force of nature. I remember when I was a board director and there were several women coming back to work and they wanted to come back four days a week. It was just absolutely no question. But I also had the same perspective. if you didn't have children or if you were male or if you were female it wasn't about a mother coming back to work it was just if you need flexible working to look after your elderly parent or you know and whatever it is it should be available to all so yeah it's you know it's it's such a tough topic and some companies do it amazing some businesses have their black and white rules and they stick by it and each are both hugely successful but I think it is narrow-minded and short-lived to not embrace you know bringing women up to the top and pining for equality and supporting flexible working um I just think it's short-sighted I don't like people that sell something that they don't do yeah I mean we see that all the time and that is it's a personal like this is not like knocking anyone in that sense but just personally like you wouldn't like to buy something from a really sustainable brand and then the owners aren't sustainable for example or like environmentally friendly and it's the same like if you're selling workspace and you're like creating these like a flexible workspaces and it's like retaining a talent and attracting talent all this like lovely talk we have but then we're not practicing what we preach what you preach yeah It's kind of a bit like, mm-mm.

17:31It's so true. It is so true. Our roles are to create environments that improve the day-to-day well-being of people within a workplace. Like, that's our job. So to then not have that in your own, I just, yes, just madness. It is. And so then you were on the board. Oh, yes. And you're a woman. Were you the only one? For some time I was. yeah yeah for some time and the gentleman I sat alongside you know to this day I still ask some of them for advice and guidance you know they're just really inspiring people that um that genuinely supported me all through those years because it's one of those things I think no matter what your education or experience no one teaches you how to go into leadership and um you can go on all the training courses in the world but the reality is very different from the training room so it's really important to have those those people around you that you just trust and rely on and support and vice versa so yeah to this day just an incredible bunch of bunch of guys and are you a mentor for anybody used to be used to be my time is a little limited these days but yeah i took great great joy and you know what i actually i'm probably inadvertently a mentor without realizing without calling it a mentorship if that makes sense because lots of the team would still call me like and I feel so privileged that they would still call me for a chinwag for a bit of advice or just to chew the fat on something see I am really really lucky but to me that's that's the thing as well like titles and branding something and making it too formal and official is very professional right but I'm quite unprofessional in the boundaries of you're my friend but also I'm your manager but also I deeply care about your well-being and I would want you to call me anytime day or night about anything if it's you know if it's of importance so yeah so I probably am without realizing it I hope I find it simply fascinating how physical space can totally change how we think feel and behave meaning it can pause distractions it can connect us it can mean we do our very best work and that's where Stansons steps in this show is created by Stansons who design make and install curtains and acoustics to create the perfect environment for people to flourish and do their very best work you've got our project on we know how it feels reach out and we'll start to talk do you mention about like being a inspiration and maybe a role model for someone like coming into industry oh like it can be done you can drive it and then to think that you're having that influence and you're having that it's great like it's good to see it do you know what i mean yeah it's super important i think i think the nice thing is is by keeping in touch with so many people if you see early on that someone feels like they can't and they just need to you can you can you got this just xyz and you're there there's nothing there's nothing nicer than just seeing like yeah someone else achieve and being their cheerleaders i'm yeah i so yeah the amount of money i mean we it kind of bit beside the point but if you see someone flourish and change and like kind of let it's that's a legacy you can't sort of cat pretend you do you know i mean it's so it's lovely it's so heartwarming isn't it yeah oh that was worth it yeah for sure however much it was how much much work it was it's worth it sure it makes me warm and fuzzy seeing like a junior that i would have from 13 years ago is now a design director somewhere and like i will always be the first one to go congratulations just fashion it like it's just yeah it's just brilliant and I think there's two very definitive strands that you can fall into in our industry and that's the lone wolves that will rise to the top and do their own thing um but our little islands and do extremely well and then there's the more kind of community side of designers who support each other to enable each other to rise up and and make their own path and yeah I'm very much in that in that camp yeah so you've been doing like from the receptionist I'm getting in the design team you've been in design 20 years yeah 20 plus yeah yeah what's the one like lesson what's one thing that like you think that you have to take into project into projects oh gosh Well, yeah, I think I've learned so many lessons over the years.

22:29And one of the biggest lessons I've learned is to never forget how to listen to a client and really understand them because you're designing for them. I think in the era that we're in at the moment, it's so dangerous to fall into the bigger is better and wow and challenge, challenge, challenge. when if you don't understand the client and the brief and you haven't listened from the first moment you've met them none of that matters and I mean I learned I learned lesson it was it was a while ago but it was a really big pitch in the industry it was all the top players and at the time I was with a business that was what I would consider probably tier two we went for it like you know did our best had fun with it um but really understood the client to use your term got under their skin but did that awful saying awful saying that i use all the time but it was it was brilliant experience and but what i produced i didn't love it was you know it was one of the designs that I would go, yeah, it's all right.

23:44But it was because they were a very humble business and their ethos was all about staying true to their roots and their originality and being humble. That was literally their word. So we focused on the detail and just trying to create the wow through little vignettes as you walk around and the flow and just connections within the space so we were really really lucky that we run it as a business it was a huge deal for that business because it was quite small and so when I had the opportunity the client showed me some of the other pictures which is always like oh it's so so great so good to be nosy he showed me one of them in particular just blew me away it was an animation and back then animations were ten a penny because they were so expensive to make and it was oh genuinely it was phenomenal like the the structure the design the coloring all the features and i felt embarrassed and i remember saying to the client i was just like well that's well that's amazing are you are you sure you want this like do you want that like let's let's workshop this out he said to me he said yeah it is amazing and we can respect how how much went into that and how interesting and and creative that is however that's not us and they didn't listen and I think from that moment on it was just one of those wow okay I must always always listen and you do see it now with with new generations coming into the workplace that they want to try different things all the time which is which is amazing innovation is amazing and to be embraced but if you're designing for yourself you're never gonna you're never gonna win it you'll always be the concept designer rather than the design and build designer because i've seen it before in interviews when you see beautiful portfolios and you say oh god it's beautiful it's beautiful so what was the biggest challenge on site and how did you link that that detail to your ceiling and your floor and oh no we didn't build it and you're just going oh okay because yeah i just think it's a missed opportunity when you don't don't get to get to the build stage yeah there's that saying that you can run really fast in the wrong direction yeah yeah well you've got great great ideas but to never see them come to fruition just sort of just i'll do a phenomenal design that's completely off brief yeah exactly exactly so it's so basic listening but i do agree yeah i think and that's one thing i really hope moving forward and bringing into like this little design consultancy would just always be at the forefront of just like you know we listen so how will you do that oh i hope by creating lovely environments for lovely clients who will understand that um that's what i do yeah i hope just just in innate um in your characteristics in your nature that you would just listen and yeah and it's it's a collaboration it's um you know i i find it very challenging when you're given a piece of paper with no interaction and you're told to just go and design something off a piece of paper and it's just very detached i find those pitches and tenders like really challenging because people learn from people like from their first interaction you'll understand what the client wants and and how their teams might work or just even going to see you know their current environment and all that all that good stuff so yeah i hope that's that's one of our our biggest kind of winner winner chicken dinner just we listen to what people do yeah no i mean i think it's so important i also think the message also for if any end clients are listening workspace space managers it's like the importance of and property portfolio night managers is the importance of a brief like that the amount of work i see and it's like it's not really briefed like like brutally and then secondly to have face time with people because you're essentially designing for people and to design without like having that connection i know i've actually pulled out of work before because I felt so uncomfortable about not having client time um in a big like four-week tender and yeah it made the bold move to say this isn't for me because I just I don't feel I'm going to do it justice and we all know how much goes into a pitch or a tender you know it's all encompassing you have to you have to give it your soul and when you sit there and think i i'm prepared to do that but i need i need like an hour or two of your time and if the client doesn't have that rightfully so if they're too busy then you know your values don't lie they're lying so yeah i think you have to be brave sometimes i do i can also see that some people might not want to make time for design a build or for anyone because it's a sales pitch whereas we need to reframe it because it's not a sales pitch it's a consultancy it's an understanding is getting under their skin it's learning them it's like it's like a marriage isn't it it's like two people coming together two companies coming together to deliver something if there's not like a conversation it's like it's gonna be pretty it's gonna be flat it'd be you'll be lucky if you hit oh i know and then it's always you know the heartbreak at the end where you if you don't get it you just think well i knew i wasn't really gonna nail that and yeah it very much is a collaborative approach like it's got to be because no one knows their business is better than the people who work in you know at the top so yeah so do you get time generally face to face yeah yeah I mean I've been very fortunate to have some really really inspiring clients throughout the years as well you know people who I'm still in contact with who I would pick up the phone and ask advice to as well and they've got nothing to do with design or design and build but just you know the way their minds tick but I think it's such an intense process especially when you do win a project and you're going through the build as well with a client it brings you together you're one team because the end result is is for everybody to to celebrate and everybody's interested it's you know it's fantastic so yeah I would say you know just persevere I just keep trying to get a little bit more face time but it's always I mean I think if you had the data of the amount of pitches that I've pitched and the win ratio the win ratio always reflects more face time just without a doubt you can design something can't you can you can get exactly so studio seven is now up and running year anniversary coming up what's the next like year two three yeah what are you looking forward to doing well I kind of it was it was a leap of faith and just in the start so I I didn't have a master plan um and now having experienced kind of what what the industry is is open to and the doors that have kind of opened it is something I would love to to grow and have a little little design studio collective that's the aspiration I think and because it was derived from I want to say this without sounding like a massive cheese ball but just being able to show our daughter that anything is possible you can do whatever you want to do so I would love to grow something that she would turn around and go wow that's cool.

31:26I think if anyone's got a son or a daughter that's listening to this I don't understand that it's not a cheese board it just sounds cliche doesn't it but yeah i think it does like kick into human nature though doesn't it it's like it's suddenly not all about profit it's about legacy it's about like inspiration inspiring people driving change like and yeah if you've got a daughter that's going to one day like look at like what she wants to do and where she wants to go and it's about like inspiring and giving them that confidence and like yeah mama did it I can do it do you know what I mean like and I think you're totally like you're gonna have a very proud daughter one day keep pushing the crafts keep coloring what are you doing after school class it's amazing what they gravitate to though isn't it yeah it is amazing what they gravitate to like yeah I find it so are your clients going to be like are you going to be working like freelance for other design and build companies or are you going to be working freelance for like end clients i would love a mixture of both so predominantly at the moment i'm working for end user d &b clients um it's what i know contacts i have um and that's been brilliant just absolutely brilliant and i know i know where i'm at you know i know the processes inside out i know the people um and it's just it's it's been really really positive but i do see friends in the freelance industry who work with you know their clients i've always said actually within the design and build pitch the most powerful uh kind of and you know all your players in the game is the designer because they will have they're not selling to the client and they're not you know the good guy bad cop money person yeah they're they are the kind of trustee of the client so yeah i mean i've seen lots of friends who have created hugely successful businesses through just clients taking them through from workplace to workplace so yeah that would be that would be wonderful but yeah to be honest there's even been a residential inquiry which is super and from a client actually so commercial client um a really up for an essential work say yes carefully yes uh yeah no i'm absolutely like yeah we're in we're in talks it's hugely exciting but you know the perfectionist in me wants to master that art before I would be let loose on someone's home but I'm very lucky that they have they have the trust in me but um yeah I think that's one thing I think you know if you could say to yourself you don't have to be perfect in everything before you you do it like just go for it and see what happens that's a prime example where I've been asked to do something because of what they recognized in the commercial project um but yet my own inner voice goes oh you're not a resi designer because it's a label isn't it but but yeah so i'm going to give it a shot i actually have had this discussion with someone before and i said well if you can design workspace you can design resi and they said no it's completely different oh gosh don't tell me that i know it's completely different because like workspace it's got different like regulations and different this different that and it is different but yeah I've worked as a designer on a resi project who isn't a resi designer it's a work designer and they did a great job and I think I personally feel like they can because the two worlds are so merged now and it just depends on the individual right and the designer, the two individuals again it goes back to that whole FaceTime and that relationship and those people and how it will work but yeah I think if you can do it, you can do it just give it a shot see what happens fingers crossed no that's amazing and i want to ask you another question what music do you listen to when you're trying to concentrate oh gosh oh oh guy this is embarrassing because my music tastes like that's brilliant proper pop do you know i'm actually into like acoustic covers at the moment just anything i'm trying to just be mellow and calm at home um I think life is so hectic at the moment for us the home environment like my office at home is now just such a calm sanctuary so yeah I have lots of acoustic acoustic covers on no voice um no voice and even a little dabble of classical I've got to say like yeah I mean from my roots I was trained cathocally in a few musical instruments and um I've noticed now I put that on actually at home when I'm just trying to trying to calm and just focus but yeah but I've got I am a bit of a pop pop fiend as well I'm not cool to be honest I am too I do I will listen to anything but yeah I do when it's not a lot of people do say when it's not got voice it helps yeah it does you defocus more yeah oh it's amazing Catherine thank you for jamming on thank you for sharing your story.

36:29Thanks for having me. It's amazing and inspiring, I think, for everybody to be like, yeah, you can do whatever you want to do. But then particularly for women to see someone that's been on a board, a board devil from a receptionist. Nothing. Look at what happens. And then to actually founding your own studio. I mean, it's just an amazing journey and the lessons from it and everything are great so thanks for sharing thank you so much and thank you for the impatient you're welcome