Women in Real Estate: Sarah Fishburne
Director of Trend & Design, The Home Depot
sarah_h_fishburne@homedepot.com | 770.384.2274 x12274
I’m one of the lucky ones when it comes to a career path. Since I was 3 years old I was telling people I was going to be an interior designer. And it came true! My journey took me from the world of design firms to The Home Depot. Here’s how it happened.
I studied design at the University of Georgia. I really wanted to design children’s hospitals and branch out to senior living facilities where I could apply color theory in a therapeutic way. I interviewed with a firm in that specialty, but it was more of an architectural firm. I ultimately joined a design firm focused on model merchandising, sales centers and country clubs where I was able to plan out new home developments, design interiors and furnish model homes.
During my eight years there, I worked on everything from low-income Section 8 housing to multimillion-dollar golf club communities. Imagine that! I was 22 years old and getting to work on such a breadth of design, from the challengingly tight budgets of Section 8 to famous golf course communities.
But then, a recession hit. That’s not great news when you are working in the housing industry. Fortunately, an opportunity at The Home Depot came up just as the bottom fell out of the housing market.
My work at The Home Depot brings everything together. I have the rare opportunity to call on nearly all my prior experience in leading both the Trend & Design and Industrial Design teams.
The Trend & Design team is involved from product and brand inception all the way to when products are available to our customers. The team looks at trends from a customer’s point of view and takes forecasting, trade show coverage, trends in colors, materials and lifestyle into consideration. One example of changing lifestyles is the rise of subscription meal kits such as Blue Apron and Hello Fresh—having fresh food delivered. It can change how consumers use their kitchens. More fresh food drives the need for more refrigeration but reduces the size of pantry space needed. This, in turn, affects how we design kitchen cabinets and other storage in the kitchen.
The Industrial Design team designs products in just about every category under The Home Depot umbrella, whether it’s a bathroom vanity, a landscape lighting fixture or even a Husky ratchet. They work on our proprietary brands like Hampton Bay, Glacier Bay and Home Decorators Collection, and they collaborate closely with our terrific supplier partners.
I’ve been very fortunate that my design portfolio now allows me to design for a renter, a first-time homeowner or empty nesters. That’s one of the things that I enjoy most in my role at The Home Depot: We get to touch so many different types of products, for so many different people at any stage of their lives.
What advice would you give to other women beginning a career in the predominantly male real estate investment industry?
You have to stay true to yourself and have confidence in your knowledge and expertise. Learn how to articulate your vision, but also listen and ask questions. The most well-designed projects and the worst always have important takeaways that you can learn from.
Is there a woman in the industry who has inspired you and
why?
There are two women I have been lucky enough to work with. Both have helped
me throughout my career: Laura Dudley, the designer I interned under at Palette
Design and Taylor Hastie, who hired me at The Home Depot.
Laura was a big reason why I fell in love with Model Merchandising and Sales Centers design. She took me under her wing and exposed me to everything. She let me sketch, travel and install jobs during my 12-week internship program.
Taylor was the reason I made the shift from typical Interior Designer into a trend and product designer. While I was an up-and-coming designer, Taylor was towards the end her of her career and she passed on great insights. She taught me how to take all my design skills and use them in a new way, and I do feel she is the reason I am successful at The Home Depot.
What is the best thing about being a woman in the REI space?
Designers interpret the dreams and visions of others for their home or design project. To be successful at that, you need to be able to listen first, so you can deliver the outcome the client or homeowner wants. I think women, by nature, like to comprehensively compile information and data before they come to a suggestion or decision. That is a quality that is so important in design, and it’s a skill you need to be a successful designer.
