Interior Designer Series - 1, Weiken

Interior Designer Series - Part 1
How do I pick an ID?  First and foremost is trust, then experience, taste and cost.
Weiken, IMM
We did not plan this.  We were wondering around IMM after work looking at furnitures and appliances.  Walking by a bookstand and it happened to be at a page where a photograph grabbed my attention.  We started to browse and a friendly bespectacled sales person came up to greet us.  He was very enthusiastic and we thought we just sit and hear what he had to offer.  After a while, in came the boss: a small, stocky guy but sporting a big strong voice.  We were introduced and he sat down to take a look.  Immediately, He showed us why he was the boss: he knows!  He knew why there was a kerb here, pipes there and explained why the current owner did things that way.  We were very impressed.  So we made an appointment to come back to see his proposal a week later.
That evening, we googled and learned that Weiken was quite a large establishment and owned by a celebrity. 
Back to IMM a week after for our appointment.  After going through the proposal, the boss tried persuading us to put down a $3k deposit for him to do a design in 3-D.  Even though the deposit would go into part of the renovation cost should we choose to go ahead with him, we politely declined.
Rating:
Trust: 1/5.  Pay a design fee?  Really?  
Experience: 5/5
Taste: 3/5 (good actually, I wanted it to be simple)
Cost: 4/5 (good)

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