A well designed home is like your favorite song-- it soothes your soul and entices your senses. It is a perfect combination of rhythm, balance, contrast, emphasis, and proportion. A harmony that we seek and deserve in our retreats.

Harmony can be found in many forms. Last winter, like most New Yorkers, I attended The Gates exhibition in Central Park.  It was an intriguing experience that captivated all of my senses.  I thought I’d take this opportunity to share with you a memorable harmony that I felt was achieved in a very special way. A poetic composition that you too can create in your home.

 

 

Harmony

Harmony, rhythm, balance, contrast, emphasis, and proportion are fundamental design principles.  A design solution is executed successfully only when all of these principles are applied to its specific design concept. 

The Gates by artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude gave us a fascinating experience as we saw and felt how a project seemingly so different from its setting, harmonized with the city and the people who experienced it. 

The setting was a 843 acres of man-made nature located in the middle of an urban jungle built with concrete and steel. Reflecting its surroundings, The Gates were angular posts and beams made of vinyl. Though rigid, they did not appear cold. They brightened the grayest sky with their saturated warm saffron color. Calm at times, nylon panels draped in a handsome, almost noble manner in their temporary but unbreakable anchors. They sometimes fluttered in the brutal wind creating a wave that gave you chills not only because of the piercing pain felt on your skin, but also the visual climax that they took you on as you followed the hundreds of saffron ripples surging fiercely against the surrounding true nobilities in hibernation. 

It was a graceful composition of contrasts that provoked our senses and brought us together. What better way to celebrate humanity and togetherness in the middle of a tiring winter than an experience made in a scale that we could share and touch? 

One gate— like one musical note from your favorite song may not be significant. It took a vision to create harmony. To compose a harmonized design at home requires no less. What do you want to express about yourself? What soothes and arouses your senses?  Let us find the notes that reflect ourselves and use them to compose our own masterpieces!

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