Welcome to Part 2 of this 3 part history of Engaging Interiors Limited. During these years the business enjoyed its most consistent work flow with some very interesting projects.
2013-2014
During this time we had started on The New Club and been re introduced to a client I had worked with as a placement student at Design LSM. My first projects for Matthew Kirby were Mongolian Barbecues in the late 90s, this time round we were helping him and John Dodds with Chozen Noodle sites. The New Club recently closed after over 10 years but I still meet up with Cathie from time to time. Chozen Noodle has been sold on except for the Excel Site. We are still working with Matthew on other sites at Excel and have a couple of concepts in the pipe line.
We also started working with Phil Turner of Turners Pies and his family. If I remember correctly Phil had been studying Quantity Surveying at university and dropped out as it wasn’t a good fit. He then went to work at the family business and realised if he swapped out some of his suppliers he could free up enough money to allow him to market the business one afternoon as week. This worked well and he approached Engaging Interiors for our help in designing what would be there second site. The first site had been going for decades so this was a big deal. We designed the site in Rustington and have been helping them expand ever since. Phil has since been on the Apprentice and it has had quite the impact on his life.
2015-2016
By this time Mick and myself had moved office to a space above the Con Club (Constitutional) in Lewes and I had taken on a full time Freelancer called Karin. Turners and Josies were expanding, Matthew was opening new sites for Chozen along with other concepts and we designed the first site for Kokomo. Kokomo traded for 10 years opening another site during COVID but like a lot of clients were hit badly by the energy crisis as well as other issues that are linked to running cocktail bars and closed last year.
2017-2018
During these years we designed the Peckham Rooms and the The Chequers in Newbury. The needs of these hotels were quite different as were the areas they were located. It was during this time that we got to design one of my favourite projects that didn’t manage to get built. It was a jaguar e type showroom for a company that specialised in their refurbishment. This was also the year that we first met Natural Fit, we are currently helping them with their 3rd site in Maidstone and very much enjoy the design process we have built on over the years.
Part 3 will be released in a weeks time. It will take us up to 2026.