I had the best experience with my designer Tracy. She listened to all my concerns. Everything she suggested took in my own personal tastes.My husband and I are so pleased with the final design

We had moved into a brand new home and wanted help pulling a style together. Kathleen came to the rescue. She listened to our needs and pretty much nailed it on the first try. We now have a space that I love to entertain in.

McKenzie Baker has helped us with selections of our furniture throughout our new home

Let me start off by saying I really like the designer I had with McKenzie-Baker in the beginning. She made a wonderful first impression. She was polite and agreeable, and really made me feel like she understood the style we were going for. I have never hired a designer before, so that was important to me, and it helped me feel secure in my choice.When you sign with McKenzie-Baker, you pay a retainer of how many hours the designer thinks they will use at the start of your project. It is important that you understand that retainer is non-refundable moving forward. There are some small things with the design process itself that are not spelled out clearly that unfortunately were what eventually put a sour taste in my mouth.For some reason, I thought that, given the times of COVID, when the designer eventually picked out the things for the space, I would be receiving a remote presentation. Especially in the beginning, when the likelihood that every piece wows you is pretty slim, it seems wasteful to have the client drive down to see these things in person. Especially with all of the technology at our fingertips to ease that burden.Alas, when the time came, I found out that I needed to drive to the studio, which was 30+ minutes away from me. Unfortunately, I didn't account for that in my schedule, so I wasn't able to make it. We pushed it back, and then I had another scheduling conflict. When I asked if I could still come in that second day we had agreed on, but then bring my daughter in another day to see things that I wasn't sure on, she told me that would cost more of my time.That kind of floored me. So not only am I paying 10s of thousands for a design and the furniture combined, but I also have to pay in the form of time in my retainer just to review the designs? Wow. The designer did end up sending a "presentation" to me remotely because I was getting anxious about getting orders in quickly given the state of the furniture world out there and that everything is backordered for months. What I received was a PDF file that looked like a catalog essentially. It had anywhere from 0-5 options of things to review. Some things, like the single arm chair and the sofa weren't included at all. Just one picture of a sofa "for inspiration." Other things that were provided with 5 options were the least desired things in the scope of the design (kitchen counter chairs). The meat of the presentation was about 2 options per piece.The designer claimed that if I went in I would've seen more of a presentation, and made mention of fabric samples (for just the couch I think, most everything else was wood), rug samples and paint chips. I'm not sure why pictures couldn't have been taken of those. And not sure why some effort of a 3d rendering wasn't made. Even if I did go into the studio, I'm supposed to imagine what a 2d picture in a catalog is going to look like in my room? With this rug sample and this paint chip?Lastly, I reviewed a few of the pieces on the internet, because the claim is that they get wholesale pricing and mark-up for their profits, but still less than what I would find retail. I found 2 exact matches online. Both were considerably cheaper. :(Overall I really liked my designer, but the design process itself is outdated, and it isn't written out in their contract. So be sure you are comfortable with all the details of the process before proceeding. Hopefully my mistake can be your gain.