July CET Designer User of the Month: Ashley Wire
As an architectural designer for Intereum Inc., a Herman Miller certified dealership in Plymouth, Minnesota, Ashley Wire designs and specifies Maars Living Walls.
“I love envisioning the way a space could look and bringing that vision to life,” Ashley said. “It takes a specific skill set to be a designer and what I find most rewarding is stepping foot into a space created from a vision.”
Ashley’s passion for design began as a child when she was always drawing floor plans and elevations of residential homes. She continued to pursue that passion throughout her education and when it came time to apply for college, Ashley knew she wanted to become an architect who designed buildings and spaces for people.
Ashley earned her bachelor’s in architecture with a second major in environmental studies from Iowa State University. After graduating college, Ashley landed a job with an architecture firm in downtown Minneapolis and worked there for three years where she learned about a variety of building types. At the end of her time in the architecture and design world, she knew she wanted to be an architect focusing on a specific product at a smaller scale. That’s when she found Intereum Inc. and began working with CET Designer.
“I had this vision that I wanted to impact people in their day-to-day lives with my talents as a designer and here I am today doing what I love,” Ashley said. “While I am no longer drawing buildings at a macro scale, I have been successfully designing spaces at a micro scale with Maars Living Walls.”
Ashley has been a CET Designer user for three years. She has become efficient in creating renderings for proposals and says Photo Lab is her best friend because it creates beautiful images quickly. When it comes to creating deliverables before winning a project, Ashley uses CET Designer to draw, specify and render Maars product. After winning the project, she uses the software for product ordering.
“Coming from the architecture and design world, I was working in Revit and AutoCAD every day, so I was a little nervous to switch to a new program since it was outside of my comfort zone,” Ashley said. “I was pleasantly surprised how quickly I picked up CET Designer and I am still discovering new things in the software today. The biggest challenge of transitioning to CET Designer was learning new keyboard shortcuts.”
What Ashley enjoys about using CET Designer is she can challenge herself to try new things within the software. Ashley says there are parts she hasn’t explored yet and enjoys being able to stretch her comfort zone within the software. Next on her list is to explore fly-through video capabilities in CET Designer to help her clients working from home visualize projects.
“Fly-throughs could be very powerful to help them visualize a space without being there physically,” Ashley said. “I believe CET designer has the capabilities to support the virtual presentation world because of all the different features we as designers have access to within the software, making it feel like anything is possible in this program. CET Designer is a one-stop shop for design and helps produce successful projects.”
Ashley’s best CET Designer trick is using the thin wall tool to quickly make film appear on Maars glass walls for renderings. She does this by drawing a thin wall in front of the glass wall, sets it to the desired height, applies a material and/or color and turns down the opacity. She says it works like a charm every time for her renderings.
“My favorite thing about CET Designer is how it keeps developing and how quickly one can develop a design,” Ashley said. “Whether it’s presentation drawings, a 3D visual or a file simply for pricing, CET Designer keeps getting better and better with new features and tools that continue to be released.”
When Ashley isn’t designing spaces, you find her spending time with her three children. Her family enjoys spending time outside and the seasons of Minnesota. During the spring you can find Ashley and her family in their garden, in the summer boating on nearby lakes, in the fall hiking along the north shore of Lake Superior and in the winter, sledding and playing in the snow.
