The trick is to buy things that look like their expensive equivalent and have "that fabulous" look.

"I try to teach people that just because something is a designer brand doesn't mean it has quality," Mills. "When I did a show on furniture, I taught people how to recognize great furniture. It's not the brand name, it's how upholstered furniture is put together.

"You can go to a flea market and find something that is just as fabulous as something in a high-end store, if you know what you're doing," she said.

The one-hour show, "Living Large," airs at 1 p.m. Sundays on News Radio 980 KMBZ and at 10:30 a.m. Saturdays on Classical 1660 KXTR.

Entercom Broadcasting, the stations' owner, describes "Living Large" as possibly the first high-end design, lifestyle and home improvement radio show in the country.

Each week, Mills chooses a design and home improvement topic and interviews a celebrity and experts about it. Typically, she will interview four or five guests. Home improvement subjects include redesign, window treatments, kitchens and bathrooms. Lifestyle subjects could be yachts, exercise, hot tubs or travel, Mills said.

After about 25 years in television, the corporate world and business, Mills is doing radio for the first time. Entercom executive producer Andrew Ellenberg developed the show's concept and recruited her last spring.

Mills remembers telling Ellenberg a design show could not be done on radio because people could not see it.

"But now that I've done it, I like it because people have fantastic imaginations," Mills said. "If I can give them a word picture, it's just fabulous what they can imagine."

Mills also finds she uses all the skills she learned in her previous careers.

After college, Mills spent four years in television. She learned how to put a show together, write commercials and promotions, do voice-overs, and go on air.

Mills spent the next 10 years at IBM, where she learned about project management. She then worked for other companies for four years before starting her own project management and marketing consulting firm.

By 2002, Mills said, she had had enough of the corporate world and wanted to go back to the business she loved, interior design. She started Interiors by Design in 2002, specializing in redesign, or remixing existing furnishings, and staging homes for resale.

Mills said her project management skills - "managing the different working parts of a project" - come in handy. These include developing a marketing plan; writing promos and making sure they go on air; negotiating with publicists to get their celebrity clients to appear on her show; and making sure the "Living Large" Web page (www.entercom.com/living large) is updated.

She wants to bring as many celebrities to the show as she can.

"People like to hear celebrities and they can speak well on air," Mills said. "I ask them about their personal lives and usually they are doing a show about the topic I'm doing, which makes it interesting for the listener."

On Sunday, she interviews Constance Ramos, formerly of ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," about outdoor spaces. She interviews personal trainer Jonquil Baugh of Premier Fitness and Nutrition about getting in shape for the swimsuit season in her lifestyle segment.

On May 7, guests include Rick Spence from HGTV on the subject "Curb Appeal" about making a house's exterior appealing. On May 14, her guest is interior decorator and author Christopher Lowell, who hosts his own TV show. Mills will discuss his latest book, "Seven Layers of Organization."

Mills said she has always wanted to be an interior designer. Of where she is now, with her own business and a radio show on design, she said, "I love what I do and I am doing what I love."

Mills, who lives in Olathe with her husband, Brandon, and four children from 8 to 20 years old, believes her radio show sets a trend in broadcasting.

"I think it's going to explode," she said. She has heard that "Extreme Makeover" host Ty Pennington and Martha Stewart are being sounded about radio shows.

Mills also speaks publicly about interior design, conducts training seminars for Realtors and posts a weekly design column called "Designer's Eye" on the Entercom Web site.

She will discuss redesign at 12:30 p.m. Saturday, May 6 at the Symphony Designer Showhouse, 6315 Ward Parkway, Kansas City, Mo.

©The Johnson County Sun 2006