The short version
Designers in Pune charge one of four ways: a consultation fee, a design-only fee per sqft, a percentage of project value for design and supervision, or a turnkey contract where the fee is quoted as its own line. Ours start at ₹35,000 for a consultation, ₹90 per sqft for design only, and around 8% of project value for design and supervision. Where the fee sits differs by model, so know which you are being quoted before comparing two proposals. The GST aspect also needs to be factored in.
If you have started calling interior designers in Pune, you have probably had this experience. You ask what it will cost. You get a number for the whole project, or a per-square-foot rate, or a promise that the design is free. What you rarely get is a straight answer to the question you actually asked, which is: what am I paying you for, and how much of this figure is your fee?
It is a fair question and it deserves a fair answer. This guide sets out how designers in Pune charge, what each model suits, and where our own studio sits. Where we publish a number, it comes from real completed projects, not a calculator.
The four ways a designer in Pune charges
Almost every arrangement you will be offered is a version of one of these four. The differences matter, because they change who carries the risk when something on site goes wrong.
| Model | How the fee works | Duration | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Turnkey | A specific line item within the shared quote | 60 to 90 days | One accountable studio, one number, no vendor coordination |
| Design only | From ₹90 per sqft of carpet area, or a lump sum | 20 to 30 days | You already have a contractor you trust |
| Design & supervision | Approximately 8% of project value | Runs with the build | Most homeowners. Our most popular arrangement. |
| Consultation | Lump sum against scope, from ₹35,000 | 3 to 7 days | Direction, a second opinion, sanity-checking another quote |
Durations are ours. Fee levels vary widely between studios in Pune, and a freelancer, a boutique studio and a national turnkey brand will each price differently.
Turnkey
One studio designs and executes the whole home. The design fee is not hidden inside the rate: it appears as its own line in the quote, alongside materials, labour, woodwork and finishing, so you can see exactly what the design is costing you.
This is where a genuine, unglamorous advantage lives. When the same team draws it and builds it, nobody has an incentive to blame the drawings for a site problem or the site for a drawing problem.
Design only
You buy the drawings. Layouts, elevations, woodwork details, electrical and lighting plans, material and finish specifications, and 3D views. Complete enough that your own contractor can build from them without ringing the designer every second day.
Charged per square foot of carpet area, or as a lump sum against scope. This is what our design services cover. This model suits homeowners who already have a contractor they have worked with, or who are managing the build themselves and want a professional scheme rather than a catalogue.
The thing to check before choosing it: who resolves the problems that appear on site? A beam in the wrong place, a slab level that is off, a wardrobe that will not clear the window. In a design-only arrangement, that is usually you.
Design and supervision
The designer produces the scheme and then stays involved through the build, visiting site, checking work against the drawings, and resolving what comes up. Your contracts with the contractor and vendors remain your own.
Charged as a percentage of project value, around 8% in our case. That structure is worth understanding, because it means the fee moves with your budget. Ask how the percentage is calculated, whether it applies to the whole project or only the scope the designer specified, and at what point it is fixed.
Consultation
A short engagement. Someone experienced walks your home, listens to what you are trying to achieve, and tells you what is realistic. You get direction and a written point of view, not drawings you can build from.
It is the cheapest useful thing you can buy in this industry, and the most under-used. It is particularly worth it if you are holding two quotes that differ by ten lakh and cannot work out why.
It also suits anyone still deciding on a home. If you are yet to buy, or the builder will still accept changes, an early conversation can save a real amount later, because the cheapest time to move a wall is before it is built.
The four models differ in one thing that matters more than price: who resolves the problems that appear on site.
What a full home costs, for context
A fee only makes sense against the number it attaches to. These are our turnkey ranges, drawn from completed projects across Pune. They are context for the fee discussion above, not the subject of this page.
| Home | Carpet area | Essential | Premium | Luxury |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 BHK | ~550 sqft | ₹16–18 L | ₹18–22 L | ₹22 L + |
| 2 BHK | ~850 sqft | ₹18–20 L | ₹20–24 L | ₹24 L + |
| 3 BHK | ~1,250 sqft | ₹20–22 L | ₹22–30 L | ₹30 L + |
| 4 BHK & above | ~1,800 sqft | ₹22–26 L | ₹26–40 L | ₹40 L + |
Carpet areas are typical for each configuration and your own home may differ. Last verified September 2026.
Full breakdown by configuration: what a 3BHK interior costs in Pune, itemised, and modular kitchen cost by layout.
What separates the three tiers
The configuration sets the floor. What moves a home from one column to the next is the depth of woodwork, the finishes chosen, and how much is bespoke rather than specified from a range. Our approach page sets out how we work through those choices with you.
- Essential covers a complete, well-finished home: kitchen, wardrobes, false ceilings, lighting, painting and core woodwork.
- Premium adds better finishes, more built-in storage, layered lighting and detailing through the living and dining spaces.
- Luxury is where furniture is designed rather than bought, imported finishes appear, and every element is drawn for the home rather than adapted to it.
Completed examples, if you would rather see the tiers than read them: a 4 BHK in Kharadi, a home in Kalyani Nagar, and one in Kothrud.
What moves the number
Where in Pune the home is
Less than people expect, but not nothing. The design fee does not change between Baner and Koregaon Park. What changes is access and logistics: a high-floor apartment on Boat Club Road with a single service lift and restricted working hours will carry more labour time than a ground-floor flat in Balewadi with an open loading bay.
Older buildings in Model Colony or Kothrud tend to need more civil work before any interior begins. Newer towers in Kharadi, Hinjewadi and Punawale usually need less, though society rules on working hours and debris removal are often stricter.
New flat or renovation
A renovation costs more per square foot than an equivalent new flat, and homeowners are consistently surprised by this. Demolition, disposal, making good, and working around what stays all take time that a bare shell does not.
What the builder already gave you
A meaningful lever, and an under-used one. Most Pune developers hand over flooring, doors, bathroom fittings and plumbing points that are perfectly serviceable. Retaining and selectively upgrading them rather than stripping them out can take a real amount off the total, and it is the single most effective sustainability decision available on a project.
GST, and why two quotes are rarely comparable
Interior design and works-contract services attract GST at 18% at the time of writing. On a ₹25 lakh project that is ₹4.5 lakh, which is not a rounding error.
The reason this matters when comparing quotes is that studios present it differently. Some quote inclusive, some exclusive, and some quote exclusive without saying so. Before you compare two numbers, establish for each one:
- Is GST included in the figure shown, or added to it?
- Does the quoted rate cover design, or is design a separate line?
- Are appliances included, or specified but bought by you?
- Is civil work included, and to what extent?
- Is site supervision included, or billed by visit?
Two quotes that look ₹6 lakh apart frequently are not, once these are equalised.
How payments are staged
Payment should follow progress, never lead it by much. Our own schedule runs as follows, and our process sets out what happens at each stage.
| Stage | Trigger | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Token | Contract signed, design begins | 10% |
| Material procurement | Orders placed, carpentry, POP and electrical work begins | 50% |
| Hardware and paint | Hardware, painting and finishing begin on site | 35% |
| Handover | Snagging closed, keys returned | 5% |
| Total | 100% |
Two principles are worth holding any studio to, including us. Be cautious of a schedule asking for more than half the value before material arrives on site: ours takes 10% before anything is ordered. And make sure a meaningful amount is retained until snagging is closed.
The fee inside a real invoice
A fee is easier to judge against a real bill than against a rate card. This is a 3BHK we completed in Pune, published with its line items intact, and it shows exactly where the design fee sits.
| Category | Investment | % of total |
|---|---|---|
| Kitchen | ₹3.04 L | 16.4% |
| Bathrooms and doors | ₹2.72 L | 14.7% |
| Living room and common areas | ₹2.56 L | 13.8% |
| Master bedroom | ₹2.42 L | 13.1% |
| False ceiling and paint | ₹2.14 L | 11.5% |
| Kids' bedroom | ₹2.13 L | 11.5% |
| Guest bedroom | ₹1.68 L | 9.1% |
| Electrical and wiring | ₹0.86 L | 4.6% |
| Post-completion deep clean | ₹0.10 L | 0.5% |
| Base interior total | ₹17.65 L | 95.2% |
| Professional fees | ₹0.88 L | 4.8% |
| Grand total | ₹18.53 L | 100% |
That ₹0.88 lakh line is the answer to the question this article opened with. On a turnkey contract the design fee is not hidden inside a per-square-foot rate: it is a line on the invoice, in this case 4.8% of the total. You can see it, question it, and compare it against anyone else's.
Read the shape of the rest too. The kitchen is the single largest category at just over 16%. The three bedrooms together come to about a third. Electrical, the line homeowners most often try to remove, is under 5%, and it is the one item that is genuinely painful to add later.
Completed and priced in 2025, at ₹1,685 per sqft. At 2026 material and labour rates the same scope prices roughly 5 to 8 per cent higher, which is why the table above starts a 3BHK at ₹20 lakh. Civil work of ₹2.51 lakh was quoted separately. The full room-by-room breakdown, down to individual units and hardware, is in our 3BHK interior cost guide.
Questions worth asking before you sign
- What exactly is your fee, and is it inside or outside this number?
- What grade of ply is quoted? "Good quality" is not an answer. BWR 710 is the minimum that survives a Pune monsoon in a kitchen.
- Which hardware brand, and is soft-close standard throughout?
- Who is on site, and how often? Ask whether the person who designed it will be there.
- What happens if we run past the timeline?
- What is excluded? Ask for the exclusions list in writing. It is more revealing than the inclusions.
- If I take the design and leave, what do I owe?
Where we sit
We work primarily on complete homes in Pune and Mumbai, most often turnkey, with design and execution handled in-house by the same team. Divya reviews every project personally, which is a deliberate limit on how many we take. You can see completed homes across the city, or read how a project runs in our process.
If you want a number for your own home rather than a range, the cost estimator gives an indicative figure in about two minutes, or we can visit and prepare an itemised proposal.
Common questions
How much do interior designers charge in Pune?
It depends on the model. A consultation is a lump sum against scope, starting from ₹35,000. Design-only work is charged per square foot of carpet area, starting from ₹90. Design with supervision is around 8% of project value. In a turnkey contract the design fee appears as its own line in the quote rather than being billed separately.
What is the interior designer fee percentage in India?
For design-and-supervision arrangements a percentage of project value is the common structure across Indian studios, though the figure varies by city, studio size and scope. Ours is approximately 8%. Ask specifically whether the percentage applies to the entire project or only to the scope the designer has specified, and at what point it is fixed.
Is GST charged on interior design in Pune?
Yes. Interior design and works-contract services attract GST at 18% at the time of writing. Some studios quote inclusive of it and some exclusive, so establish which before comparing two figures.
Is the design fee charged separately or included in the price?
It depends on the model. In design-only and design-and-supervision work it is billed on its own. In a turnkey contract it appears as a specific line item within the shared quote, so you can see it rather than having it absorbed invisibly. Neither is better in itself. What matters is knowing which one you are being quoted, so you can compare two proposals on the same basis.
Should I pay for design separately or go turnkey?
Go design-only if you have a contractor you already trust and are willing to resolve site problems yourself. Go turnkey if you would rather one team carried responsibility for both the drawing and the build. The most common regret we hear is from homeowners who bought design cheaply and then discovered that nobody owned the outcome. We compare the two in turnkey vs design-only.
How much does a 3BHK interior cost in Pune?
Roughly ₹20 lakh upwards for a typical 1,250 sqft carpet area, rising with the depth of woodwork and detailing. Full breakdown in our 3BHK interior cost guide.
How long does a full home interior take in Pune?
Most full-home projects run 45 to 120 days on site depending on size and the depth of bespoke work. Design and approvals typically add three to four weeks before site work begins. See the week-by-week timeline.
Is interior design charged per square foot in Pune?
Frequently, yes, and on carpet area rather than built-up. Our design-only work starts from ₹90 per square foot of carpet area, sometimes quoted as a lump sum against scope instead. Always confirm whether a rate is on carpet or built-up area, because the difference is usually 25 to 30%.
