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HI Connect Spotlight - Claudia Baker, President of Baker Design Associates Today we speak with Claudia Baker, President of Baker Design Associates as part of our series focusing on the hospitality designers, architects and purchasing pros that are part of HI Connect Design. Thursday, March 22, 2012 Glenn Haussman

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Baker Design Associates, Inc. Hospitality Design & Procurement

HI Connect Design March 21-23, 2012 at the Gaylord Opryland in Nashville, TN promises to be the most exciting event ever to hit the hospitality industry.

We’ve got more than 50 built out vignettes created by the vision of leading hospitality designers, architects and purchasing pros. And those in attendance will get to step into their master creations, get a tour and see products in the content in which they belong; in a real hotel environment!

As part of HI Connect we’re interviewing the people that are bringing their creative vision to life.  Read the story below, or for a more fully in-depth interview listen to their story below.



For today’s interview we have Claudia Baker, President of Baker Design Associates, designing the futuristic guest room during the three days of HI Connect Design.


Glenn Haussman: You know a futuristic room sounds really, really pretty cool, so what are some of the things that you’re thinking about here with creating a futuristic room.   

Claudia Baker: Oh we’re doing some really exciting things.  We’re trying to really think again outside of the box.  [Laughter]

Glenn Haussman: Yeah.

Claudia Baker: We love that term.  And we’re coming up with some furniture that is very, very clean and contemporary, things that you’ve never seen before.  Putting metallic in the carpets, cantilevering the furniture.  Using fabrics that no one’s ever used in a guest room that’s very, very contemporary and clean and coming up with things like the room will change colors as you watch a video and whenever you change the video.  The room is gonna actually change colors.

Glenn Haussman: Oh that’s pretty cool.  That’s pretty awesome.  So is it more like a mood room so if I’m feeling like really good it’ll turn one color.

Claudia Baker: [Laughter]  I wish we had that technology.  [Laughter]  I think Bill Gates is the only one that has that, but that would be – yeah that’s kind of the next step in the technology that we were working on actually.

Glenn Haussman: Yeah, that’s pretty neat.  So you know you’re trying to extend the dialogue of what actually a hotel room can be for the guests.  So what are some of the things that you were thinking about when you go through the design process for something like this?

Claudia Baker: Well being that it’s futuristic you know we have to think of what is the future gonna be like, and what I looked at is you know I don’t think we’re gonna have a whole lot of wood available to us.  So I think we’ll be using a lot more manmade products such as metals and acrylic and porcelain tile and things that are made you know by man, not things that are made in nature such as wood.  So we were utilizing those types of materials and only those types of materials and putting this all together plus coming up with the latest technology and colors that are very, very bright.  Primary colors are gonna be really, really in in the future as will metallics.  So kinda pulling all this together and making it look like nothing you’ve ever seen before [Laughter] or after.

Glenn Haussman: Yeah.  So that sounds pretty good, but how do you keep something that’s so far out there and creative but still seems to be tethered in something that people could understand easily?

Claudia Baker: Well I think some of our technology that we used in the guest room like even a round closet on casters that can be moved to different parts of a guest room.  I think people would love to use that today, so we’ve tried to come up with ideas of things that could actually be used in a guest room right now.

Glenn Haussman: That’s good.

Claudia Baker: Yeah.  So even though it’s a futuristic idea and it might be a little more expensive now to do than it would be maybe later on down the line, I think that the ideas that we’re using in this room would definitely be of interest to clients right now.

Glenn Haussman: Yeah.  I kind of see this room as like you know concept cars at auto shows and that kind of stuff like what is the potential of what design could be if people put their minds behind it.

Claudia Baker: Right.  I absolutely agree with you.  I mean you know we have to be thinking of where are the problems that we have in a typical guest room, and I think one of the biggest problems was the closest, so when we came up with this round closet that can be moved on casters.  It was kinda cool.  And when you open the acrylic door it lights up you know.  I mean just something that will solve the problem that we’re having now.  In the future I think that keeping areas clean is gonna be a big thing, to be virus free, right, so people don’t get sick going from one room to another and you know having things cantilevered off the floor so everything could be really kept clean and you don’t have dust bunnies under the bed and you know that kind of thing.  I think you’re gonna see a ton more of that in the future.

Claudia Baker: We have the room half in tile and half in carpet, but one of the things that we did was we encased the window treatment within two pieces of glass so you can’t touch it.

Glenn Haussman: Oh that’s pretty cool. 

Claudia Baker: And it’s remote controlled but you know it’s hidden in between two pieces of glass.

Glenn Haussman: How does all of this dove tail with where you see the state of hospitality design today?

Claudia Baker: Well I think right now, especially now where we’re going through a recession and the economy is you know just been up and down.  I think that always changes you know the way design evolution comes about, because our clientele needs some kind of boost to build their morale.  You know everyone when they’re going to a hotel nowadays I mean they want something that’s gonna make them feel better, and we call that kind of mood changing environment.  And by brightening your color scheme and you add metallics, you can contemporize the furniture and utilize some really interesting technology in the guest rooms and public areas.  You can create a whole new atmosphere in you know your project. 

Well I kind of feel that’s kind of where we’re going right now is I think you know all the designers are kind of trying to really think of things that are new and different to give their guest room or their public area that pop and something that’s gonna really attract people to come in the door and wanna stay over. 

Glenn Haussman: How did you know that this was your destiny?

Claudia Baker: My father was an architect and a designer, and my mother used to design these beautiful hand-painted blouses.  She was an actress, but she would do that on the side to make extra money for some of the actresses that she knew.  So she had that talent.  My dad had the talent.  I was kind of brought up with five kids in my family of everybody kind of wanting to be an artist and a designer.  So I started out as a design artist, was gonna do packaging design.  Next thing you know I’m being hired at the age of 16-1/2 years old to design casinos. 

Glenn Haussman: My goodness.

Claudia Baker: And my dad was my boss.

Glenn Haussman: Oh my goodness. 

Claudia Baker: Yeah.

Glenn Haussman: [Laughter]  So what was that like you know being in the casino universe at such a young age?

Claudia Baker: You know it was probably the most exciting time in my life.  I loved every minute of it.  I worked with some of the most talented designers in our industry.  Like one minute I’m working with this incredibly talented carpet designer that I would look over his shoulder – and I was a kid you know, and he’s doing these unbelievable casino carpets with like 29 colors, and I’m asking him all these questions.  Well how do you come up with this and how do you decide what color to use?  And it’s like what you’re asking me. 

And this is how I learned, so I would learn one thing at a time.  I would learn how to pick artwork or I would learn how to design a carpet or write a speck or you know pick some kind of interesting fabric that’s gonna go on the barge of Caesar’s Palace you know the bar that has the great big barge in there.  Each day it would be a different thing that I would do until pretty soon you kind of put it all together as a package, and you’ve become a designer you know.