It's time to set the stage.

After escrow closes we drive up to our new home filled with ideas and expectation! We are excited, confused and overwhelmed by the daunting prospects of how to begin to make it our own personal paradise.

There are stacks of boxes to unpack and pieces of furniture to arrange. Our new empty home doesn’t feel like home. There is no personality. It’s just an empty shell!

On second thought, our brand new home is actually a blank canvas for us to enhance the quality of our lives!

As a Feng Shui Interior Designer, I work with my clients, teaching them the benefits of having a home that directly reflects who they are now, including their personal taste in design and their lifestyles.

Each of us has the opportunity to create a living environment inside and out that fully empowers us to be vital, comfortable, healthy and at home. Not only is there the opportunity to have the home embrace each family’s unique life style, but for it to lift our spirits as we wake up, as we dash off to work and other activities, as we return each day to relax and interact with family members, and as we retire to our bedrooms for deep rest and rejuvenation!

Many homeowners also have home offices that they work out of daily; thus the home front shares dual meaning and impact on the lives of those who live there.

We are intimately connected with our homes! How we embellish them with wall decorations, how we arrange each room, what colors we choose, what floor coverings we use, all contributes to feeling ‘at home.’ Our choices of furniture, lighting, and textures play a role in creating that special space. It is vital that we think about what resonates with us and intuitively makes us ‘feel’ good.

First impressions: creating an appealing entrance

Some new homes have no foyers or narrow ones, many have high ceilings, and several have all off white walls and floors - all of which add to the intriguing, yet intimidating dimensions of a new home. We’ll have to address these to have our home feel cozy and comfortable. While moving in however, we can contribute to our peace of mind in a few ways.

In Feng Shui the front door is considered the mouth of ch’i, or where the beneficial vital life force and life’s opportunities are encouraged to come into our lives each day. What greets us as we walk up to our front doors and as we walk into our homes through our garages can set the tone for balanced, stress free living. We are our most important guests. We need to select items that please us, including door mat, door color and perhaps a planter by the front entrance. As we walk into our foyers, having a vase of beautiful flowers or a favorite painting will lift our spirits. If we are uncertain of what we want, we start with placing one thing that makes our hearts sing and expand from there. We have taken an important first step, starting the creative bonding process! Formulating an action plan for the design of our own personal paradise will come next! We have to start with what we know.

Here are some questions that facilitate that process:

1) What is your lifestyle?

2) What will each room be used for?

3) Will anyone work out of your home?

4) Do you have children?

5) What are my preferences for décor, including color, enhancements, bold design or something more soothing?

6) Which rooms will our family spend the most amount of time in?

The answer is often in our scrapbook

We need to pull out those articles and pictures of rooms that we’ve loved. This compels us to remember others’ homes where we have felt alive and comfortable. We take notes, in many cases small mental notes, of what specifically resonated in each environment for us. This may include what made that spa bedroom suite feel so embracing when we luxuriated there. The plan for a home will evolve and blossom, coming from our hearts. If we decide to work with a professional, we need to find one that we relate well with that we can trust. Establishing a relationship that is clear, up front, and responsible is critical to satisfaction and to the professional serving each client fully.

Answering these questions and more, whether we do it ourselves or with a design professional, will help to give us a practical approach in choosing what will empower us in our brand new surroundings!