12.12.14 | Chelsea Keiller has a bachelor of fine arts degree in interior design from Syracuse University in New York. She started her career at an architecture firm as a designer of corporate interiors but, when the recession of 2009 hit, this kind of work slowed down. Chelsea was presented with the opportunity to work for a dealership. After experiencing the technicality, creativity and potential of commercial design, she was hooked. Today, Chelsea is a designer at Red Thread, a Steelcase dealer in Boston.

“The thing I love most about designing is the variety of work,” Chelsea said. “Being able to design something different every day gives me the ability to be creative, use my mind and rarely be bored.”

Chelsea has been using CET Designer for about a year and a half now. She primarily uses the software to draw plans, create specials and compose renderings but will soon also be using the software to create quotations.

“CET Designer has changed the way I work by instantly providing photorealistic 3D renderings,” Chelsea said. “Before CET Designer, drawings were 2D, black and white and/or required many more steps and rendering programs to provide the quality that CET Designer can easily handle in Photo Lab.”

She also likes that CET Designer lets her create 2D and 3D drawings, specifications and pricing all at once.

“It takes fewer steps to specify, for example, all parts of the panels in a workstation, including the panel height, width, skin and power,” Chelsea explained. “And one of my favorite things is the ability to ‘flick’ your mouse to the left to cancel out the command. I use the ESC key less often now.”

Chelsea believes she has been able to learn CET Designer at a much faster pace thanks to Configura's Support and Training team.

“The webinars and training have been very helpful to me,” she says. “Whether it’s a simple or complex solution, it’s nice to always have the support available. The best part is that it doesn’t require a long phone call because the support team can simply view my screen and figure out the problem first-hand.”

This past October, Chelsea also attended the CET Designer User Conference for the first time.

“I thought the conference was very helpful. It was great to hear from other dealers and designers about their experiences with CET Designer, and I returned with knowledge from the breakout sessions and from people I met who are ‘power users’ of the software.”

Chelsea thinks that the Edit Graphics Extension is the best feature in CET Designer.

“I use it all the time,” Chelsea said. “The fact that you can make a special look the way it is but still assign a model number and special quote number to the furniture piece allows for the plan to match the specifications.”

Chelsea currently resides in South Boston where she gets the best of both worlds – city living with a short walk to the beach. She enjoys running in races – yes, the Boston Marathon is one of them! – to clear her mind and stay in shape. However, for “fun” she enjoys traveling to tropical islands, reading books and watching American football, especially the New England Patriots.