Furnishes complete cost estimates for clients approval. Makes necessary purchases, places contracts, supervises construction, installation, finishing and placement of furniture, fixtures and other correlated furnishings, and follows through to completion of project ``.

In addition to this the U. S. Civil Service Bureau, when examining applicants for government positions as interior designers, expects that ``when various needed objects are not obtainable on the market he will design them. He must be capable of designing for and supervising the manufacture of any craft materials needed in the furnishings.''

This seems like a large order. The interior designer, then, must first be an artist but also understand carpentry and painting and lighting and plumbing and finance. Yet nobody will question the necessity of all this and any reputable interior designer does know all this and does practice it. And further he must understand his obligation to the client to not only meet his physical necessities but also to enhance and improve his life and to enlarge the cultural horizon of our society.

Few will quarrel with the aim of the schools or with the wording of their curriculum. It is in the quality of the teaching of all this that a question may arise.

The old established independent art schools try their best to fulfill their obligations. Yet even here many a problem is presented; as in a recent design competition with a floor plan and the simple command -- ``design a luxury apartment''; no description of the client or his cultural level, no assertion of geographical area or local social necessities -- simply ``a luxury apartment.'' Working in a vacuum of minimal information can result only in show pieces that look good in exhibitions and catalogs and may please the public relations department but have little to do with the essence of interior design.