"Designing Women" focuses on sisters Julia Sugarbaker (Dixie Carter) and Suzanne Sugarbaker (Delta Burke) who despite being opposites, run a business together. Julia is an elegant, outspoken liberal intellectual; Suzanne is a rich, flashy, often self-centered former beauty queen. Together they have launched Sugarbaker Designs, an interior design firm which Julia manages while Suzanne (mostly a financial backer) simply hangs around and annoys everyone under the guise of being the firm's salesperson. Rounding out the "Women" is the pragmatic designer Mary Jo Shively (Annie Potts), and the sweet-natured but somewhat ditzy office manager Charlene Frazier-Stillfield (Jean Smart). Bernice Clifton, an absent-minded friend of the Sugarbaker sisters' mother played by Alice Ghostley, also appeared frequently.