Monday, July 23, 2012

Feng Shui Manor

I've always kept feng shui principals in mind when decorating or renovating our homes. I'm not a slave to it . . . but I definitely keep it in mind!
For anyone who doesn't know what Feng Shui is, in short: 
Feng Shui is an ancient art and science developed over 3,000 years ago in China. It is a complex body of knowledge that reveals how to balance the energies of any given space to assure the Health and good fortune for people inhabiting it.

I've always had an interest in Feng Shui, I think it appeals to the control freak lurking inside me. The idea that I can shape and control what happens to us, by organizing and decorating our home . . . I AM IN!!!
Through all of my research I've always come to the same conclusion, whether it works or not . . . feng shui  has some great design principals and good tips for keeping order!
Each compass direction has it's own corresponding area of your life for example, South is Fame, West is Children, North West Mentors and helpful people. The theory is that if you're having trouble in a certain area of your life make a change in that part of your house!
Here's our Main Floor Feng Shui Map:
 1. Our North West corner is our Living Room, it's our Mentors and Helpful People sector. The Best color choices for this corner are Grey and Yellow, since we can't do grey we do a bit of yellow. West is the best wall to hang family portraits . . . hence our grouping of family portraits above the fireplace (on our west wall). West is also the best wall to have a metal element, electronics like a TV are considered a metal element and so it's also good that our TV goes on that wall!
2. North is the Career Sector of the house. This area is where you hold your career luck. Because ours in at our backdoor it's hard to decorate it but we are planning on painting the door a yellow or blue color (both would activate some career luck), a picture of a waterfall beside the door would also help!

3. Education sector, ideally this would be where our library should go, but because it's our dining room there's not much to do in there except keep it tidy and clutter free!
 4. Children sector is on our steps, this is definitely a place where we could use some help. I hung two Bird pictures because in feng shui birds are auspicious, although I should definitely add a picture of children or at least add another bird to symbolize three instead of two!

5.Family and Health sector, blue or green are the best color for that sector. It happens to fall in our kitchen so I'm planning on adding more green accents. Green plants are great in the sector so we have our large pothos ivy plant.
 6.The Marriage and Romance sector of our house is in our Library/ Office, not exactly the most romantic area to have it. So I'm slowly adding more red or pink accents because that should activate some more romance ;).
 7."FAME!!! I'm gonna live forever!" The South is the Fame sector, which happens to be at our front door, this area would love some red, but in the absence of red some bright lights would do the trick and our front hall is very bright! And I'm basically super famous so it must be working ;).
 8. Lastly we get to our houses trouble spot. Our wealth sector is missing from our main floor. We are lucky though, because we have a front porch that fills it out. So I've made sure that our front porch is always tidy and we put some nice patio furniture out there, with some nice new cushions! And since we've furnished the deck, we've seen a little more money luck coming our way!

But, the number one Feng Shui tip has to be . . . NO CLUTTER! Clear out all clutter, clutter stops energy and air from circulating both are VERY bad Feng Shui!
I hope you liked our little Feng Shui Crash Course. Just the very basics if you enjoyed it let us know and maybe we could make Feng Shui tips a monthly column.

26 comments:

  1. Sounds like me! I love the idea of Feng Shui but I'm not a slave to it. One of the things I make sure we do is position our beds so that the foot is not facing the outward door. And a few other things here and there.

    You just inspired me to get out my book and make a floor plan! Love it!

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  2. Thanks for this! I have been somewhat into feng shui for a while (into it as in, reads about it but then gets paranoid when we don't have a lot actually done for feng shui).

    Our master bathroom is wealth and our walk-in closet (connecting the bathroom to the master bedroom) is family/health. Two areas I would definitely like to nurture. Any ideas?

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  3. Thank you for the tips. I've been interested in feng shui but don't necessarily have time to read a book about it. Love how you covered in concisely and with pictures. Happy Monday!

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  4. Consider moving your chest by the main door. Shar chi shoots out of corners and blocks a major entry.

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    1. Thanks Jasi,
      Our front door and back door line up directly facing eachother so we needed a vingette to slow down the chi! Ideally it would have more rounded corners but for now it will have to work.
      Thank you for the info though! I really appriciate it!
      Lots of Love
      Ashli

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  5. I love your insights into Feng Shui. I would certainly be a fan of weekly installments. :)

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  6. Great post!
    I'm wondering where you found your living room coffee table?

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    1. Thanks!!!
      The coffee table is from Homesense!
      Lots of Love
      Ashli

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  7. Thanks for sharing this. Years ago I pored over every feng shui book I could find and implemented much of it into our home as best we could. I still keep many of the principles in my mind when making decisions. When we moved into our current home I never really did go through and feng shui all of the areas. It's a great reminder that little adjustments might make a huge difference.

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  8. You make is so much easier to understand! I'll have to go through our house and determine what area is what, and then get to work on implementing a few fang shui ideas.

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  9. I would indeed like to learn more about this. Fascinating!
    Brenda

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  10. What an interesting read today. I would love to find out more about it. I find it interesting that I seem to have instinctively followed some of the rules. Just this weekend I moved my writing desk to the North wall. Partly because that's where it fits. Hopefully it will help me on my path to being a writer. ;)

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  11. Loved the tips and would love this to become a regular column! I've always been interested in Feng Shui too and you presented everything in a very understandable way! :)

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  12. Thanks Ashli... another great reason to keep the home free of clutter.

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  13. Very interesting post. I did a lot of reading up on Feng Shui several years ago when we were renting a home and going through some tough times. We ended up moving and I forgot all about it. We could definitely use some positive energy again, so I'm glad I saw this post.
    Have a wonderful day!

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  14. I dig Feng Shui...took a course at my local garden center over five years ago and was hooked. It helped inspire my blog name as well as the name of a rental property we own in the name of an LLC..both are have "Red Door" in the name - -my dream is for both to bring me wealth. I am a true believer in anything that gives you a positive edge...most of the principles just make good sense....especially never leave a toilet lid up because your wealth can go down the drain...LOL!!

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  15. I enjoyed reading this because I have always been interested in Feng Shui; however, I've never really looked into it because I thought it would be difficult to understand. You made it extremely easy to follow along. I would love to see a post about this again!!

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  16. I would love to see a Feng Shui installment. I have not found a helpful website yet! Loves this post and all the helpful hints! Thanks!

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  17. Please continue to write about Feng Shui, I would really love that!

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  18. I like all of your posts, but this one especially. Yes, I would definitely like to see you do a running segment on Feng Shui! In fact, I have a question you might be able to answer or post about? We have a porch that goes across the entire front of the house - does this mean that the sectors start on the porch or once you enter the foyer? (I ask this because of your porch situation). Also - we normally enter thru the garage door, would this change the orientation of the sectors or does it go by true North?

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    1. Hi Laurie,
      You don't have to include your porch, you can if you want but generally you wouldn't. We do because without it we are missing a major section of our home. If you're not missing any sectors I would suggest NOT including it. But Keep in mind your front entrance is really important, the porch infront of your door should be really clean and tidy, clutter and messes would attract bad chi!
      Also I always study the Compass school of feng shui so it will always go with True North!!
      Hope that helps
      Ashli

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  19. Hi!! I loved this post and would love more like it. Would it be possible for you to share the feng shui books that you read and use to decorate with? You have me SO interested in this concept right now that I would really like to read the books about feng shui that you do. Thanks!!

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  20. I would love your feng shui tips. Like you, I don't want to be a slave to it, but I think it's good to keep in mind. I think rooms people are naturally drawn to probably have good feng shui.

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  21. Hello, thank you for sharing these feng shui tips. I am really interested in finding out more but get a bit muddled with conflicting ideas in various books. Therefore a weekly tip from you would be fantastic, especially if you have ideas about increasing wealth and productivity in my office area:) Warm Wishes, Amanda x

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  22. hi,I have ben reading alot about fengshui but I am confused with what is the best method to use,Ba Gua or compass? I have a house which has a few areas completly missing from the house plan.It is rectangle in shape and an extension in an angle on the right hand side of the plan, so I have no idea as to how i can complete the plan into a square so that I can include remedies for the missing area.Can you please advice on how to fix the problem.Hope to hear from you soon.

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  23. How do you know if you are missing an area?

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