What is important in life?

A big screen color television and a new car!

Lol! Some people are of this state of mind. I am not one of them.

What keeps coming up and is more pronounced by information currently available for those who evaluate such things is that the value and importance and completeness of a life well lived is one in which the emphasis has been on the quality experiences one has known as opposed to the quantity of physical accumulations and financial worth one leaves behind.

Of course, not every one is going to agree with this evaluation, but it definitely has wisdom on it’s side.

Have you ever thought about the total time of your life that is spent inside your residential interior environment?

Looking back, of if you would prefer, look forward and evaluate the quality of that time as a part of your overall existence on this planet.

Is such important to you? Are you comfortable and satisfied where you are or would you like to make changes for what ever reason?

The day-to-day existence of residential life with all of it’s ups and downs and all of the emotional, psychological, functional, financial, intellectual, et cetera aspects experienced there in can be greatly enhanced in spaces that are aesthetically pleasing as well as functional.

Where are you and where would you prefer to have been?

Food for thought.

We are all familiar with the practice of doing things your self rather than hiring some one to do it.

There are also personal and professional concepts that some people insist upon using for their personal residential interior space.

The engineer must have his house done in the most efficient, economical, and functional manner. There is to be no emotion or decoration. The results are to be determined by math and science completely. Surprise! The resulting residence looks and feels like an engineering project and not a home.

For those people whose status is second only to breathing, although it is never discussed or acknowledged, and whose goal is to look like old money and aristocracy, every thing must be old, faded, and well worn by use. Up to date lighting is deemed too commercial and is not allowed. Modern conveniences are only allowed for the barest extreme necessities. Any thing that is mass produced is frowned upon. While these people are pleased living with such results, to others it may appear stuffy, stale, uncomfortable, pathetic, sad, and lacking in desirability.

Then, there are those people who select a different direction in that every thing must be the newest possible and manifest the current trends as if their life style requires them to live in the current moment. Any thing which does not reflect such is chastised and banned. The down side of designing in this style is that fashions change and such interiors easily become dated and start looking out of place.

There is another group which I have encountered whose joy is in shopping at garage and yard sales and proclaiming what they have discovered and now own. They relish this residential living environment. For all of their searching, exploring, and discoveries, there is not any thing in their house that is of quality merit.

Then, there is the building contractor, residential or commercial, who builds his own house. It is to manifest all of the concepts and ways of doing things and materials learned and used over the course of his business history. It is a show place for what they do. They are set in their way of doing things and that is how it is going to be and no outside influence is going to affect their results.

We are all individuals with our unique personalities and are free to express ourselves.

What ever your personality or profession, one will not achieve desirable quality aesthetic results with out applying the principles of aesthetics and the laws of physics.

What is your diy concept and how has it, or not, manifest itself in the residential interior environment you have chosen for your self?

Food for thought.

Your style is what you choose for your choices and activities and represents you.

There are many factors which affect your choosing style.

Your dna, your upbringing, your education, your personality traits, your financial situation, your culture, past and present, the time and place in which your live, et cetera are all determining factors in what you choose as your personal style.

Many of these choices are made subconsciously and we may not be aware of them, but they are present and manifest.

Part of choosing your personal style is determined by how important such is to you and what you choose to do about it.

Recent articles about styles in the housing industry have come across my desk and are important because they affect the direction and activities of the house and home furnishings industries.

Whether you think about it or not, your personal style is there in what you choose and do.

In thinking about your residential interior space it is important to examine and decide what level of quality you want and the role that aesthetics plays in you decisions.

Generally speaking, we only choose the best options of quality and the highest level of the tastes that we like in the shopping, preparation, and eating and enjoying foods.

How does that principle apply to your choices in the design of your homes?

Your options are only limited by your circumstances and expenditure of your resources.

How important is your residential style to you and what have you manifest for the world to see as you?

Food for thought.

Celebrity residences currently on the market are among the information about the housing industry in this country that came across my desk during the last few days.

The majority of these residences were in the many millions of dollars price range.

There were several aspects of these current residential offerings which stood out to me and were not positive about the interior design there of.

Most of them were of enormous size to the extent that they were almost redundant. While it can be very luxurious to enjoy having more space than you will need or use, too much is too much and becomes more ego and financial display than good design.

Many of these enormous spaces were under furnished. All well designed residential spaces regardless of their size should should be completed aesthetically or they can be compared to a large meal of empty calories and flavor. What’s the point?

In many of these on the market celebrity homes, the furnishings used were very blah and did not come together as a complete and balanced aesthetic composition.

The home of a internationally know and financially successful individual came across as a run away freight train. Basically, all of the background and all of the furnishings used were individually designed and abundantly expressed coming across as a totally emotional and decoration result with no intelligent thought given to the resulting aesthetic composition and could be best be describe as a room filled with art objects and not as a well designed residential interior. It was her choice and we are all free to live in the residential aesthetic environment we choose.

What can we learn about good design from these examples?

Size, price, location, social-economic status, et cetera in and of themselves do not necessarily result in good design.

The principles of aesthetics and the laws of physics apply to all residential designs regardless of the traits just listed.

Taking this knowledge into consideration, how have you chosen to apply it to you own personal residential environment?

Food for thought.

Rarely am I surprised at the housing industry information that comes across my desk. Last week was an exception.

According to Zillow, blue bathrooms can sell for up to $5,440 more and blue kitchens can sell for up to $1805 more.

The causes of these changes are not known to me.

New colors are constantly being introduce by makers, colors of the year are introduced by paint companies, and mass trends for certain colors often come with mass production, but the price increase by using one particular color is, to me, some what of a new quirk.

Colors for any interior space should be chosen because they are the best for the use, aesthetics, functions, and personality and life styles of the users using the principles of aesthetics and the laws of physics and it’s relation to the outside conditions and placement location.

To make a kitchen and bath blue merely to make more profit for the seller may be desirable for the seller, but what does it say about the intelligence and aesthetics of these spaces over the long haul?

Is this new movement simply a blip in the time of design or a movement toward a new course of action?

How do you go about choosing the colors used for you kitchen and bath room?

What happens to this movement will decided by the passage of time.

Food for thought.

Several businesses in the housing industry have presented their results from various means as to the changes home owners want for their residences as a results of the pandemic.

Among many listed are more flexible spaces, more functionality for spaces, porches, more indoor to outdoor spaces with more covered outdoor spaces, more use of color, office spaces, drop zones for deliveries, different entrances, larger family bathrooms, and flexible storage spaces.

Many companies who presented these results have built model houses to illustrate the uses of these changes.

Upon viewing the photographs of these models, I concluded that they have missed a very important aspect of residential living.

These houses are ugly.

It could be compare to have come up with the perfect foods for your life style and needs, but the foods chosen are unappetizing and taste bad.

Who is going to want to eat such food or live in such a house?

In the physical manifestation of anything for the human race that involves the emotional, psychological, intellectual, and personality of the individuals who are to use it, the elemental aspect of beauty is a very important one

Yet the makers of these model houses have not done such.

To produce attractiveness, beauty, and desirability in any physical manifestation requires using the laws of physics and the principles of aesthetics.

Where are you and of what are you aware in any changes in your at home activities and life styles as a result of the pandemic?

Food for thought.

When Jackie Kennedy moved into a house after her husband’s death, a newspaper reported that an interior designer from New York came down and “prettified” it.

Certain interior residential spaces of well known widows were described by the press as being “artful” in appearance.

Some interior residential interior spaces, furnishings, and houses have been described as “modernistic” in the print and advertising media.

Some writers have described certain residential spaces they have covered as being “tasteful” in the manifestation there of.

What do these words mean to the people who use them and what does it say about their knowledge, research, and understanding of interior design?

Along with the emphasis on selling as opposed to designing used by many people in the residential industries, using such words reflects the lack of knowledge of what is interior design by such people.

So, what does this lack of knowledgeable mean and matter in your personal and day-to-day living in your life?

Think of all of the resources you expend on where you live, especially long term, such as costs, maintenance, improvements, time living there, emotional and psychological, life styles, functions, comforts, convenience, et cetera.

For the role that your personal living spaces plays in your life during your time on this planet, is is not worthy to be knowledgeable about these spaces as you are about the other important aspects of you life?

We are all human beings on this planet and our decisions determine what we experience during that time.

What does the quality of where you live, what you want there, and what you do or not do mean to you?

Food for thought.

One of the current housing situations in this country groups that come across my desk reported that one of the main features potential purchasers wanted was pantries

Plenty of and specialized storage is generally not at the top of the prioritized list of traits when designing and building houses these days.

Yet, it is one of the main characteristics which make our homes more comfortable, efficient, and functional.

I have yet to see, hear, or read about any house that had too much and too specialized storage.

There are, however, non-positive reactions and comments about the opposite of the previous statement.

A pantry is a closet for the storage and use of foods, containers, utensils, and any thing else used in the kitchen.

The very old house in which I grew up had a large pantry which had been added on to the kitchen. It was well used, handy, and kept out of sight and provided storage space for many food items, dishes, flat wear, linens, and receptacles for trash. Ours was sometimes used to hide Christmas goodies.

The bottom line, if you want a panty for your kitchen, there are basically two options available today.

If you have the option and resources, you can design and build the size and features you want to fulfill the needs for your life style.

There are many storage systems currently available for kitchens today which have numerous swing out doors and shelves which can store an enormous quantity as well as cabinets that have doors and shelves which can store a lot.

Seek to make the best use for storage all of the spaces you have available to use.

These principles can also be used for any space for any storage purpose in all areas of buildings.

Food for thought.

” My experience is what I attend to. ” William James

Pretty good statement on what we experience in many areas of our lives.

What is your personal experience of your residential interior environment?

What is it that you want, need, like, and enjoy during your time at home?

How well does what you experience when at home fulfill the above aspects?

How important are these aspects to your life as a human being living and being in the time and place where you now exist?

Have you ever evaluated these aspects, their importance to you, what you have or don’t have in these areas, and what would be, for you, the perfect home interior environment?

You live in your residence. It is your life there. You make the decisions and have the responsibility for what is manifest where you live.

To what you expend your resources for your residential interior environment determines what you experience.

What do you want your experiences at home to be and what are you doing, or not doing, to bring such into being?

Food for thought.

Periodically, paint companies come out with their offerings for paint colors for the current year. Some paint companies even give seminars to present and explain these choices.

In theory, these selections are supposedly based on current events and environments related to current times.

How ever, one should keep in mind that residential interior colors are not changed as often as one changes choices for lipstick and nail polish.

Think in terms of how long a paint color will be on it’s surface before it is changed.

Paint colors that are used because they are the color of that year can some times be too strong a statement which can become tiresome and end up looking dated.

It is good that chemical and manufacturing and new discoveries are being made which gives one more choices of available colors.

For the most intelligent choices in selecting paint colors for one’s residential interior environment, choose, or have custom mixed and made, the colors that are reflective of the life styles, preferences, and are the best for the highest level of aesthetics of the space and those people who will be using it.

You don’t have to be a sheep and follow. You can be your own individual self and choose your own pathway.

Food for thought.