Friday, October 26, 2012

Feng Shui Lighting

 
Lighting can greatly enhance the Chi in your home. There are numerous options including incandescent and halogen electric lights, candles, oil lamps, fireplaces and natural light. Improve the Chi flowing through your home by illuminating dark corners, camouflaging sharp angles, and warming gloomy rooms with lighting. Consider leaving low wattage lights in all the time in rooms with no natural light, or consider installing a light tube as in the picture below.  This home office was an interior room in the Career area, which was always dark. The natural light now pouring in has greatly enhanced career energy.
 

Lighting can also be artistic, and be used to balance the elements. Light itself represents the Fire element, but the colors and shapes of the fixtures bring in the other elements. The red hanging lamps in the picture represent 4 of the 5 elements (red – fire, yellow-earth, wavy lines – water, metal – the fixture) they hang above a flower arrangement (wood) creating a 5 element display. The gold glass wall sconce represents earth, water, and fire. It is used to illuminate a long hallway.    See more beautiful hand-blown glass at www.nourot.com.

 
In all cases choose fixtures you love! Collect lamps that add personality to your décor. Let the light that fills your home be a reflection of your taste and creative expression.

Friday, October 5, 2012

Feng Shui Enhanced Kitchens

Kitchens are very important rooms in your home because, in Feng Shui, food symbolizes health and wealth.  The idea behind this is if you are prosperous you have more money to purchase food and stay in good health. Therefore enhancements and locations of kitchens in a home are very important. One of the most auspicious locations is in the Center Area, because kitchens are considered the “hearth” of a home, and the center is the area for centering and grounding. In this location earth tones and ceramics help with enhancement. In other Bagua areas the enhancements need to align with the attributes of that particular sector. (To read more go to Newspaper Columns - Aug. 2011)
For instance some pictures below demonstrate how our kitchen in the Love and Romance area is enhanced with pairs of items, shades of red and pink, and romantic representations.
There are a few other specific enhancements that can be made in all kitchens – no matter where located: 1) Always declutter kitchen countertops. Put away items you don’t regularly use. Make plenty of room for meals to be enjoyably prepared and for the Chi to flow. 2) Keep your knives completely out of sight when not in use (use a drawer knife block rather than one on the counter). 3) If the stove is located next to the kitchen sink, place a healthy plant, flowers, or bowl of fruit between them to represent the wood element, thus balancing the elemental relationship between the sink (water) and stove (fire).