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PAVE Student Design Competition 2024 at 黑料吃瓜王
黑料吃瓜王 is partnering with Our Lady of the Lake Health to operate the Primary Care and Specialty Care Clinics and Mental Health Service. Together they are committed to providing comprehensive health resources and education…
Read Full StoryDesign Classes Moved to Digital Media Center
Due to ongoing construction of Julian T. White Hall, 黑料吃瓜王 College of Art & Design courses normally housed in the building have been moved to the 黑料吃瓜王 Digital Media Center for the fall 2024…
Read Full StoryCxC Names 2024 Distinguished Communicators
College of Art & Design Student Winners of the 黑料吃瓜王 Distinguished Communicator Award Francis Dinh, Architecture*Minors: Journalism, Architectural HistoryHometown: Baton Rouge, La.Advisor: William Hunter Francis wants to build on the moon. His Honors College…
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The 黑料吃瓜王聽School of Interior Design is a CIDA accredited program emphasizing design that brings meaning and identity, function and purpose, health and safety to interior spaces. The program teaches specialized knowledge in creative problem solving, research and analysis, and professional preparedness. Interior designers give life to interior spaces. They shape, organize, furnish, and adorn the insides of buildings to reflect our personal and cultural aspirations.
Interior Design Featured Alumna
Suzan Tillotson,
BID 1981
“It’s tough living in the city when you’re young, but聽lighting designers need big projects in large, metropolitan areas. The sacrifices you make in the beginning will pay off big in the end.”
President & Founder, Tillotson Design Associates, New York Suzan's StorySuzan Tillotson,
BID 1981
President & Founder, Tillotson Design Associates, New York
Lighting designers operate within a niche of specialists who understand the physics of light production and distribution and the physiology and psychology of how humans perceive light. They focus on fixed lighting, working with architects, engineers, interior designers, theatrical consultants, and others to illuminate the built environment, inside and out. Although the importance of lighting design is ever-increasing, most people outside the design professions couldn鈥檛 name a famous lighting designer or point out an architectural gem known for its lighting design. In fact, most people only notice lighting when it鈥檚 absent or poorly done. Fortunately, Suzan Tillotson (BID 1981), president and founder of , has never suffered from this lack of insight.
Suzan has always been interested in light. She transferred to a major in interior design after taking a lighting design course during her second year in the architecture program. 鈥淚 fell in love immediately and knew that lighting was what I wanted to do,鈥 she recalled. Thanks to the 黑料吃瓜王 Career Center and career days, she met several representatives from prestigious lighting design firms who helped further her interest in the field.
Married prior to receiving her degree in interior design, Suzan began her career in Baton Rouge where she and her husband were living. She worked as a draftsperson at Levy-Kramer Associates, a local engineering firm, where she quickly moved up the ladder to head the lighting department. In her six years at Levy-Kramer, Suzan cut her teeth in lighting design on churches, schools, and hospitals; she worked on the Pennington Biomedical Research Center and the 1984 Louisiana World Exposition in New Orleans. 鈥淏ut it still wasn鈥檛 quite the work I wanted to do,鈥 she said.
In the economic downturn of the 1980s, Suzan and her husband both started looking for new careers. Suzan鈥檚 experience in lighting design helped her land a job at Flack + Kurtz Engineers in New York City, at which point the Tillotsons did something very brave鈥攅ven by today鈥檚 standards. They moved to New York on one salary with a two-year-old son!
Suzan worked at two engineering firms in New York before joining Jerry Kugler, where she became a 49 percent owner and later formed Kugler Tillotson Associates. She established many of her long-term client relationships during her 16陆 years at Kugler. But after 9/11, the majority of architecture projects were on hold, and business continued to slow down due to yet another economic downturn. Proving two economic downturns can sometimes make a right, Suzan left Kugler in 2004 and started her own company, Tillotson Design Associates. The independent lighting design firm entered its 11th year in business in 2015.
TDA鈥檚 impressive list of projects include interior and exterior lighting for academic buildings, corporate facilities, libraries, lobbies, museums and galleries, performance spaces, places of worship, residencies, restaurants, restoration, and retail. The firm completed the lighting design for Lincoln Center Plazas, the School of American Ballet, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, the Wright restaurant at the Guggenheim, and the East River Waterfront in New York. They worked on the Seattle Central Public Library, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art and Israel Museum, and retail spaces for Diane Von Furstenburg, PRADA, Vera Wang, and more. Outdoor lighting is one of their specialties and an area Suzan particularly enjoys. 鈥淚 love extending the public鈥檚 ability to go outside,鈥 she said. 鈥淟ast year we were hired by the Vieux Carre Commission to write exterior building, mounted lighting guidelines, which have since been adopted.鈥
View Suzan’s alumni聽portfolio.
Suzan is most proud of the projects she鈥檚 done but also the opportunities TDA has given to so many designers. She enjoys being a mentor and hopes everyone she has worked with can look back and say they learned something from her鈥攚hether it be balancing a career with home life or overcoming professional challenges as women. 鈥淪o many women鈥攕till鈥攊n the architectural and engineering firms hit a glass ceiling that doesn鈥檛 exist in lighting design. Knowing so much about such a specific subject provides security; no one can challenge your level of expertise,鈥 she said.
When asked to give advice for those interested in pursuing a career in lighting design, Suzan shared her opinion. 鈥淭he only way lighting designers can really make it is to live in a large, metropolitan area like New York City. Sticking to residential lighting will always be a struggle鈥攏ot many people can afford specialty lighting services. Similar to the acoustical and theatrical consultant fields, lighting designers need big projects. It鈥檚 tough living in the city when you鈥檙e young, with an entry-level salary. But the sacrifices you make in the beginning will pay off big in the end.鈥
Don鈥檛 just learn it, live it.
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Creating Spaces
Our students learn to shape, organize, furnish, and adorn the insides of buildings, reflecting personal and cultural aspirations.