AfriPulse
Nigeria’s built environment is changing at pace. Real estate contributed 5.88 percent to Nigeria’s GDP in Q4 2024,¹ and according to Knight Frank Nigeria’s Lagos Market Update H2 2025, construction activity outperformed the broader economy through the second half of last year.
NBS data confirms the construction sector grew at 5.57 percent in Q3 2025, above the overall GDP growth rate of 3.98 percent.
The spaces in which Nigerians live, work, recover, and do business are being built, fitted, and finished right now. The professionals shaping those spaces are interior designers and decorators. And yet, for too many business owners, developers, and property managers, finding the right qualified professional for the right job remains a frustrating, unclear process.
The Interior Designers Association of Nigeria (IDAN) is changing that. With the unveiling of a refreshed institutional identity, the association is stepping forward as the single, trusted platform that connects Nigeria’s full interior design ecosystem, making it accessible to everyone who needs it.
Interior design and interior decoration are related but distinct disciplines. An interior designer brings technical training in space planning, building systems, materials, and human-centred environments to transform a space from the inside out, shaping how it functions,
how it feels, and how it performs for the people who use it.
An interior decorator specialises in the aesthetic dimension of a space: colour, finish, furniture, and styling. Both disciplines matter.
Both serve real client needs. And both, until now, have operated in a landscape where standards, certification, and professional accountability have been inconsistently applied and poorly communicated to the clients and businesses that rely on them.
IDAN’s refreshed identity, grounded in the association’s core values of Standards, Professionalism, Advocacy, Collaboration, and Excellence, marks a deliberate and expansive new chapter.
The association is building a unified ecosystem: one that extends a genuine welcome to interior designers, decorators, students, educators, and allied trade professionals at every stage of their journey.
From the practitioner just starting out to the established professional with decades of work behind them, IDAN’s platform is designed to serve, recognise, and advance the full breadth of Nigeria’s design talent.
Speaking on the milestone, IDAN President Jacqueline Aki stated:
“This refreshed identity is a statement about the kind of association we are committed to being, one that is as wide as the profession itself. Interior design in Nigeria is practised by talented people across a broad spectrum of disciplines, backgrounds, and experience levels. Every one of them deserves a professional home that sees them, supports them, and holds a standard worthy of their work.
“For business owners and developers, this matters equally. Nigeria’s interior design services market is growing at 7.7 percent annually.
“The demand for professionally designed spaces, offices, hotels, healthcare facilities, retail environments, homes, is real and it is rising. What has been missing is a clear, reliable way to identify qualified professionals and understand what you are engaging. IDAN exists to close that gap. Our refreshed identity is the outward expression of that purpose. The work of delivering on it is already well underway.”
For property developers, corporate bodies, hospitality operators, and homeowners, IDAN’s renewed direction offers a clearer pathway to qualified, accountable design professionals. Whether the need is for full-scope interior design on a commercial fit-out, or decorating and styling for a residential project, IDAN is building the platform that makes finding and engaging the right professional straightforward and trustworthy.
IDAN’s ambition extends beyond Lagos. The association is expanding its footprint across Nigeria, with active engagement deepening in Port Harcourt, Abuja, Kano, and beyond, and positioning itself as a continental voice for interior design excellence in Africa.
The Africa interior design market was valued at approximately USD 24.3 billion in 2024 and continues to grow steadily, representing one of the most significant opportunities for Nigerian creative talent on the global stage. IDAN intends to ensure Nigerian designers and decorators are equipped and positioned to lead within it.
Nigeria is building. The spaces being created today will define how millions of people experience their cities, their workplaces, and their homes for decades to come. IDAN’s invitation to the profession, and to every business, developer, and client who relies on it, is simple: build it right, build it well, and build it together.
Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha
Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha is the Aviation Correspondent at BusinessDay Media Limited, publishers of BusinessDay Newspapers.
She is also the Deputy Editor, BusinessDay Weekender Magazine, the Saturday Weekend edition of BusinessDay.
She holds a BSC in Mass Communication from the prestigious University of Nigeria, Nsukka and a Masters degree in Marketing at the University of Lagos.
As the lead writer on the aviation desk, Ifeoma is responsible and in charge of the three weekly aviation and travel pages in BusinessDay and BDSunday. She also overseas and edits all pages of BusinessDay Saturday Weekender.
She has written various investigative, features and news stories in aviation and business related issues and has been severally nominated for award in the category of Aviation Writer of the Year by the Nigeria Media Nite-Out awards; one of the Nigeria’s most prestigious media awards ceremonies.
Ifeoma is a one-time winner of the
prestigious Nigeria Media Merit Award under the ‘Aviation Writer of the Year’ Category.
She is the 2025 Eloy Award winner under the Print Media Journalist category.
She has undergone several journalism trainings by various prestigious organisations.
Ifeoma is also a fellow of the Female Reporters Leadership Fellowship of the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism.
Source: Businessday.ng | Read the Full Story…
