Auburn Interior Design students showcase creativity, innovation at 2026 INDS Senior Exhibit

“I would advise them to be shameless in their networking because they are their own brand and their ideas are their currency,” said French. “Just know as many people as you can know and just be shameless in building relationships and knowing other people and the human connection.”

In addition, Mannington Commercial served as one of the sponsors of the senior exhibit where Isabella Mueller earned a free trip to Chicago to experience NeoCon and Fulton Market Design Days after being chosen as the best of show winner. Senior Abbey Peska was also recognized with the distinguished portfolio award.

One of Mueller’s senior exhibit projects titled, “Chromatic Rhythm” was based on a redesign of Spidle Hall using biophilic creation.

“My whole project was based off of a chameleon,” said Mueller. “For several different reasons, the main problem within Spidle Hall that I addressed is the lack of proper lighting so that was my main focus to use a circadian rhythm approach where I used inspiration from the chameleon because just like our circadian rhythm, our body shifts from morning to night and a chameleon also shifts in their environment. A fun fact about chameleons is that they can independently move each eye so that inspired modular design within my project to make sure that every student can adapt to their environment and modify anything in their surrounding space to better their academic success.”

For Sarah Prior, another graduating senior in the INDS program, the work leading up to the INDS Senior Exhibit became a pathway for her to earn a great job opportunity upon graduating.

“I think the most valuable class I took was the commercial studio,” said Prior. “It’s a huge learning curve and very deadline driven and hard but for me personally, I think our program does a good job of teaching you what you need to know but also giving you the room to figure things out yourself. I think the whole semester kind of wrapped up giving us these practical tasks, but it encouraged us to think outside the box and for me, that was really cool because it helped me get my job because they saw me doing all these creative things.”

Prior will take those skills to the west coast where she will begin her interior design career in Los Angeles, California working as an intern with Walt Disney Imagineering on the interior design team.

While the INDS Senior Exhibit gave students a chance to breathe and reflect on all the hard work and time put into their projects, ultimately the amount of commitment put in the last four years can lead to great achievements.

“Something very valuable I learned in the INDS program is that you get out of it what you put into it, said Mueller. “That comes from all sorts of things whether it be work ethic, how much hard work you put into a project, networking and the relationships you make, and it’s all gotten me to where I am now.”