AUTHOR | AWARD-WINNING DESIGNER | BUSINESS OWNER | CONSUMER BEHAVIOR SPECIALIST | INTERNATIONAL SPEAKER | EXPERIENCE CURATOR
Lyn Falk has devoted over 35 years to teaching and helping retailers and business professionals build healthy, purposeful and productive spaces that move hearts, minds & merchandise.
Her expertise in retail design, business, science, consumer behavior and environmental psychology has helped her develop designs that not only meet but often exceed her client’s projected goals/sales.
Lyn’s clientele represents over 35 different retail industries including heavy hitters such as Allen Edmonds, Aveda, Blue Bunny, Breadsmith, Harley-Davidson, the Kohler Company, Mercury Marine, Miller Brewing Company, Road America, S.C. Johnson, Sears, and Smoothie King. Thousands of independent retailers have benefited from her expertise as well.
In addition to guiding and overseeing her creative team, she is also a registered Interior Designer and retail/design consultant. Her work demonstrates the positive influence a well–designed environment has on occupants behavior and a business’s bottom line.
Lyn Falk currently serves on:
CREW National Retail Council
People’s State Bank – Board of Directors
MATC Design Advisory Committee
Milwaukee BID21 Placemaking Taskforce
In 2023, she was selected as one of southeastern Wisconsin’s “Notable Women in Construction & Design”
Lyn Falk has taught at the University of Wisconsin – Madison in the Retail Department, and has developed course curriculums for senior level university students, manufacturers, and retailers and CEU courses for interior designers. She has spoken to thousands of professionals, citizens and students, and her work has been acknowledged over 150 times in over 80 different publications.
Lyn has served as a speaker and consultant for the National Main Street Center for over 20 years. She has worked with over 70 communities, helping them define and strengthen their mission, identity, and retail/business districts in an effort to combat competition in urban sprawl.
Lyn authors trend-setting and “How To” articles for numerous trade publications. She wrote a comprehensive store design workbook, entitled, “Designs that Move Minds & Merchandise”, and wrote a popular column called, “Conscious Spaces”, that ran for 8 years in the Outpost Exchange, a publication on holistic living.
Lyn spent two years co-developing and co-teaching a program that addressed the American with Disabilities Act, helping retailers and shopping center personnel cost-effectively accommodate customers with physical and mental challenges.
Her message challenges existing perceptions and strives to inspire new ideas that work in harmony with our rapidly changing world. After hearing her speak, you’ll never look at your built environment the same way again. (Click here for a list of speaking topics and speaking engagements.)
2018 – Started LMF Studios, a division that brings the same design philosophy and services provided to Retailworks’ clients to those in the corporate, healthcare, and club/hospitality industries.
2008 – Co-produced “Nature in the City”, a documentary on the Milwaukee-based, Urban Ecology Center, which was nominated for a Midwest Emmy.
2006 – Created, wrote and produced “Healthy Style,” a one-hour special for public television on healthy, eco-friendly design & living. It aired on over 90 stations nationwide via American Public Television.
2002 – Founded Solterra Studios – a division dedicated to helping raise public awareness to the importance and benefits of creating, living and working in beautiful, healthy, sustainable environments.
1995 – Started Retailworks, Inc.
She earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Wisconsin in 1983, with a double major in interior design and art. She has completed the coursework for a master’s degree in business and design from the same university. She turned her thesis on consumer behavior and the retail experience into a comprehensive workbook for retailers.
Registered Interior Designer in the State of Wisconsin, 1997 – Present.
Associate member of International Interior Design Association, 1995 – 2018.
Ms. Falk serves on numerous business, educational and civic boards.
