#BlackMarket- Rich Designs Studio w/ Karlous Miller

Rich from Rich Designs pulls up and talks about getting into architecture, which includes designing homes and different beer breweries around Atlanta, GA.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Standing on the goddamn corner smoking down. My bad. We
don't drug tests, head what we do, but we only
hired the people that fail coming here passing up fucking
drug testing. You snitch, you're not not Yeah, yeah, you're

(00:36):
not worthy drugs. Yeah. Well, well we don't want you around.
We don't want a bunch of sober motherfucker's in here.
Oh shoot, I'm sucking up, working up. I'm soring, sucking up,
I'm knocking over ship. It ain't man, I'm working up
ship all the time. Know what the fuck I'm doing.

(01:02):
I don't want you. Just want that girl touching on you.
She think I give about I think she's coming background.
We had tank on here, make up and ship. I
didn't kick this ship two minutes halt, All right, don't

(01:25):
worry about it. How you living over that? Man? Good? Look,
we've been in and trap for a little minute, and
I've been wanting to do some you know, re decorating.
You know, it's timeing to elevate. This ain't even mine,
So I ain't worried about this mine look good. But
you know I've always be thinking about the architectural designs

(01:47):
and ship like that. You know, just how to make
sure look flat futuristic, thinking about starting a little community
of you know, small houses and ship I don't know
why though I'm charging the big rent there, small house
with a big rent. That's how I'm living though. But
I got somebody in here with us today that's gonna

(02:07):
really help us figure all this out. Bro, our design
problems are no more. But before we do that, you
know what, I don't like to go to work unless
people know that this you know, the black market is open.
That's all the bell symbolizes. Welcome to the black market.

(02:28):
Once again. I got my man Rich reading here from
Rich Designs. Rich. Welcome, Welcome, welcome this company. Now that
couch makes dreams come true. We have every time we
have somebody on the couch, we always tell them to
make a wish because it comes true. Prosperity for every Yeah,
that couch prosperity there you go, and couches blessed by

(02:51):
the best. We had a Boodoo lady come through and
I ain't gonna tell you what she did. But what's
up man? What's been going on? Man? Just working in uh,
you know, making dreams come true for people who want homes,
communities and uh, commercial properties. Check this out. You thought
I was I was bullshit. And when I told you

(03:12):
before we got started, Now that everybody's here, tell him
that we've had people come through here bringing up his
his work already rich designs, So your work already procedus.
How did this stuff come about? Real talk getting tired
of making money for other people. I love that I

(03:33):
did make some money for yourself. That's what we're washing them.
Yeah in in in black ownership, you know, one more time,
one more times. The word black ownership scared people so much.
They act like we're gonna own something and then like,
I don't know what they think gonna happen, but they're
scared for us to have some ship. I don't know

(03:53):
what that's about. And um, sometimes the uphill battle, but
you got, you know, persevere and keep going. And I
work for major, major firms, huge firms. I've been practicing
for for fifteen years. And it was it was it
was time to step out, you know, it was time
to all right, make the leap and say, I'm gonna
dedicate my time and effort to specific people people in

(04:17):
our community in Atlanta, specifically city of Atlanta, and outside
of that and Uh make dreams come true and and
and make them feel as if they have UM a
hand in and design process. Not only just designed for them,
but there um really integral in the in the whole process.
Like a lot of my clients are really close friends

(04:39):
of mine, now you know what I mean. That's how
integrated I put the design within them. You know, fifteen
years in the business. Give me some of your favorite
designs that you've done. I'm talking about something that you
look back like, boy with it. Yeah you see this
ain't no getting no edges on this. Yeah. We don't
cut corners the ages. Um true. I designed a brewer

(05:02):
and kennethsau horned out brewery. UH design homes on in
uh Kirkwood Clay Street. Uh four houses. They're all in
the row, so you can go down there and look
at them. They're all modern homes. Um, I've done historic homes.
I got permission to say this from her. Uh it's
the first house off a boulevard right across the street

(05:25):
from the bp UH in in Grant Park, City of Atlanta.
Total redo of her house that's uh sits on the hill.
Can't miss it. First house on there. Um. So yeah,
those are those are the ones right now that I
can say, you know, that's dope. That's what's up. Man.
This some of your work, right This is some of

(05:46):
my work. That's the brewery in kennethsaw right there. That
was adaptive reused. That was nothing. It didn't look anything
like that. It was just empty space a brick. So
I added on to it. The inside is just it's crazy.
It's maybe. And I've seen you've got some some articles
over here. Yeah, a couple of articles that was written

(06:07):
about me as a um being ah entrepreneur here in
Atlanta and making a difference in the city, in the
city landscape and fabric and uh so yeah, So what's
going on with the industry right now? I know one's
COVID hit, random pressure everything up. Yeah, lead times were slow,
prices were going up. Um, but now we're seeing it

(06:28):
come back down. We won't get that effect. So don't
go to home depot and think you're gonna get wood cheap.
It's gonna hit a little bit later. But the prices
are now finally coming down. Lead times are coming down.
Usually I would have a lead time of six months
or more. Now it's gonna be like three or four months.
So we're seeing we're saying things come down now, but
construction is not stopping them. What's new in construction though,

(06:52):
you use the whole architect and all that. So like, man,
I remember the whole downtown fabric um has changed over time.
I remember when Buckhead it wasn't Buckhead now. I remember
they had the clubs and then they tore it all
down and then it's now. So we are Atlanta's constantly growing,

(07:13):
constantly growing, to the point where we gotta fine space
for stuff for the for the high rises, in the
in the Moltor Family and all that good stuff. But
it's never gonna stop. So yeah, what we need to
be looking forward to though in the future, what they're
about to start putting in houses man, Man, everything it's
like college campuses are now hotels, homes are now like

(07:35):
luxury apartments. But your square footage price is gonna definitely
go up and it's gonna stay going up. Um. And
if you hire someone like me, I'm very innovative, so
I think of the new stuff. I set the trans
So I don't want you to say go look for something,
come to me and I'll tell you what you want.
That's hard as usually, I usually flip that like, don't
go looking for the new Yeah, I have just hired me.

(07:57):
I got you covered. And and a lot of people
don't know what it's like to work for architect and
and that's why I started my own studio is because UM,
I hand hold my clients. I walk them through the
entire process. So any questions, text me, call me, email me.
I'm quick to respond and I'll let you know what

(08:20):
is necessary from design going through the city permits. I
have relationships with everybody in the city of Atlanta and
other jurisdictions, so you don't have to go and deal
with that. I have an entire team of mechanical, electrical
employment engineers, have a contractor on board. Um that's trustworthy
because a lot of people don't like dealing with contractors
straight up, So I kill all that lead work for you.

(08:43):
It's a one stop shot. Okay, So we get this.
The whole point of this platform is to bring people
in from different industries and things like that. You know,
they look like us, So we gotta get some game
from a fifteen year veteran in this industry. What what
like advice are you given to young black architects and

(09:04):
designers and things of that nature who are coming up
in the industry. Yeah, stay creative, stay innovative, learned from
other people, and keep an open mind. Um, and stay persistent.
If you want to become an architect, Uh, it's possible,
It's definitely possible. But just stay creative as possible because
when you get out in the rail world, you've got

(09:25):
people that it's hard and and they want to hold
you back and they want to kill your creativity. Don't
let them do it. What kind of game did you
pick up working for the big firm? What not to do? No?
The good ship. I'm like, okay, I see why this
works for the Yeah business learning the business of architecture. Um,

(09:47):
because they stayed in business for a reason and it's
not me of us. So I learned how to how
to deal with the money, all the things that's behind
the scenes. Uh that I can deal with the money. Um,
it's we have good contracts. You gotta know your contracts
and and and then have revenue the back up each project,

(10:09):
you know what I mean, And and keep You'll be
fine if you can keep your client within their budget.
Once you see that that you're gonna burn You're gonna
burn through fees easily, easily, So you got to know
the money and keep to a budget period. You know,
did you get you could be very very creative with

(10:30):
limited resources. That's what you do with it. Yeah, that's
that's what pushes the creativity, that's what that's dope man.
What can they reach out to you and start their
projects through? Rich oh Man? Um, Rich Design dot studio
is my website, not dot com or dot net. It's
Rich Design dot studio. Uh social media? He own that

(10:54):
dot com, Instagram, rich read uh studio. Um. It's easy
to find out heavy heavy presence on the social media
platform and then Facebook retreat. You know the phone number
because they can hit me up directly. You know, now
this this show go crazy. You just wait till they

(11:15):
hit you on social media because hold on, because I'm
about to lock in. I already told you the projects
I need already I got you do it. Anything you
want to leaving with um, just hit me up. Your
projects in good hands with me. Our team will will

(11:36):
give you a good a good service for a good
price and have a real dope design. And it doesn't
matter if it's adapted, reuse, commercial residential doesn't matter or
ground up. We do it all and we have an
entire team that can service everybody's needs. Hold on, you
got to put it in here, trip, But yeah, man,

(11:58):
keep doing good work. I told you your word is
already out in the streets man, people talking about what
you've got going on. And yeah, we'll get a project
in and we'll post it on here and people like
rich read did that. Yeah that'll be hard, man, but
we appreciate you stopping through the black than drop everything
for them one more time so they can hit you Instagram,
rich Design dot Studio website. It's rich Design dot studio

(12:21):
as well Facebook. Just look up rich read um and yeah,
I'll get back with you. Well, jo there, you have
give me enough, bro, because I definitely need my project
started right here on the black Market, making it happen
the Black Way, South Show, black Market, rich read designs,

(12:46):
Oh you want me to