U.S. Business Review
Le Creatif Designs: A 'Creatif' Drive

By Kathryn Jones   

 

Before Angela Page founded interior design firm Le Creatif Designs in 2000, she was a senior accountant quickly moving up the corporate ladder. However, while attending a company party to celebrate a colleague’s milestone career anniversary, Page had an epiphany. “I could spend the same amount of years being an accountant,” she says. “But I knew it wasn’t for me.

“It occurred to me that either I’m going to continue to be focused on my corporate career and live each day wondering what would have been if I had lived out my dreams, or I’m going to step out on faith and realize my creative talent as an opportunity to drive my income. My dorm room, my first apartment and my home purchases were all brand new toys to me. When I think of the nights I stayed up until early morning hours working, it wasn’t finance or accounting I was working on. It was design.”

At first, Page held onto her corporate job while doing design work for repeat clients on the side, but eventually quit to concentrate solely on Le Creatif Designs.

In 2006, her efforts paid off when she was awarded a $20,000 grant from The Miller Urban Entrepreneurs Series, an annual contest sponsored by the Miller Brewing Co., which recognizes outstanding business concepts and creative drive in young minority business owners nationwide. The year before, Page was working on her business plan and showed it to a friend who lives in Milwaukee, who encouraged her to apply for the contest.

“I noticed that it said if you made it past regionals you could give an oral presentation of your business plan in front of the national judges,” she recalls. “I know my business and what I expect from it. I breathe it; I live it; so, once I knew that was an option, all I had to do was get in front of them to really make my point.

“A couple of days after I submitted my business plan, my sister passed away unexpectedly and I was devastated. At that point, I questioned whether I should be putting my fate in front of me and leave my corporate security.

“I thought to myself, ‘I can’t do it now that my sister is gone and my family needs me.’ But, everyone said, ‘There’s no business for you in Rhode Island.’ I said, ‘That’s OK; I have my accounting degree to fall back on.’ But it was my family that convinced me to go back to Atlanta and continue to pursue my passion and live out my dreams.  

“When I came back, I found a letter that said I had made it past regionals and it hit me,” she continues. “I thought, ‘Girl, get up! Go in front of them and impress them. Don’t give up now.’ I thought of my sister and how proud I could make her. I took that strength with me and used it throughout the presentation, and I blew their socks off.”

Page used the grant towards a mortgage down payment for a two-story gallery in midtown Atlanta. “[The grant] gave me a good foundation to put with [the financing] I already had,” she says. “Having a background in accounting has helped, too. It gives me the opportunity to know where my money is going, where it’s coming from and how my assumptions about the industry will translate into dollars and cents.”

Le Creatif Designs Gallery will have its grand opening in early October, Page says. “It’s in a mixed-use building with 155 other units, so that creates an opportunity for traffic and clientele to come down and peruse and hire design services for some of the painting techniques,” she adds. “Or, they could pick up pieces to accent what they already have.”

The second level of the gallery will primarily be used for office space.  However, the design of the space will be focused on staging a liner-style condo for purposes of advertising model home designs.  

“I’m living out the American dream by going outside the box and stepping outside of corporate life,” she says. “A lot of people see that and are inspired by that test of faith. They see the passion I have for what I do and know that anything designed or purchased from Le Creatif is going to be exciting, it’s going to be unique and it’s going to be creative. And, I’m taking this level of expectation with me as I step onto this new plateau.”