As I think back on how life ushered me into a career in architecture, I see that in large part what attracted me to residential design in particular was the realization that people really care about their homes and are inspired by them. They know that a house can be more than just a place to live in and a place in which to store their stuff.
But what I hadn't realized until recently is that it was their longing for something more that made them so attractive to me as clients. It wasn't just that they wanted a higher quality of living space. They also wanted a better quality of life, an increased sense of well-being, and somehow they knew that a beautiful and well-designed home could provide a more stable platform from which to seek this enhanced life.
Although we normally associate the word "home" with a place that's built of bricks and mortar—or studs and siding, in today's version of building materials—in fact, home is much more than that. It is a feeling and a way of being in one's life rather than any specific place. As this realization began to dawn on me sometime during the early 1990s, I started to understand what my architectural colleagues and I are attempting to do when we design houses that are beautiful: We are creating a lens through which the inhabitants of the house can experience more of who they really are and who they are becoming. The beauty of the form provides places for moments of epiphany in the experiencing of everyday activities.
The Power of Beauty in Everyday Life
Just recently I found a quotation in a book by A. H. Almaas that perfectly describes this state of affairs:
"The fulfillment of our life is to see life objectively, to see what's really there... Life is the expression and fulfillment and celebration of beauty. This is what we're here for. We're not here for anything else."
When your house supports the moreness that you are becoming, your activities transcend their normal boundaries. They're not just washing the dishes, helping the kids with their homework, and feeding the dog. They become mindful engagements in which the beauty of the surroundings gives you a foothold in a different level of awareness, a different state of being. Whether an object or a setting is beautiful or meaningful to anyone but you is irrelevant. It's what that thing or place is accomplishing in your life that counts.
A Childhood Memory of Beauty
When I was seven years old, I discovered the magic of falling in love with a beautiful object. The experience took me completely out of time, and I remember it today as though it had just happened.
There was a store that I'd passed many times that had always appealed to me. Its window was filled with housewares of one stripe or another, but they weren't the run-of-the-mill variety. Each object was more like a work of art, some handmade and some manufactured, but all crafted with an elegance that made me want to gaze at them for a long time.
Standing before the window, I felt exhilaration, an experience I still get today when I got to a good arts and crafts show. It's as though I could feel the creativity and care that had gone into the making of every one of these objects. My eyes moved slowly from one item to the next: a set of coffee mugs; a glass carafe; a dish towel imprinted with an intricate pattern.
And then I saw it—the object that captured my heart. It was a plate of plain white porcelain, very simple in form, with a design painted on its flat center that evoked memories of a wildflower garden. I was totally intoxicated by the beauty of what I saw.Of course, after the moment passed and I remembered where I was and what I was there to do, this was what I spent my money on that day. It was a treasure I kept with me for many years.
The Role of Beauty in Daily Life
That experience was a pivotal "aha" moment in my life, the moment I recognized the power of beauty to transcend time and create the conditions for inspiration to take hold. It has become a tool for staying aware, and I use it still to help loosen the grip that time can have on me. All of us have experienced similar moments in our lives.
A more recent example of this phenomenon involves a tile that I purchased at a craft fair and that is now built into a sitting space in my newly remodeled office in my home in North Carolina.
I bought the tile more than a decade ago for clients who I thought might like the design motif for their kitchen backsplash. It was one of many very beautiful patterns made by an artisan, Nawal Motawi. I'd had a quick conversation with the artist and knew as I was speaking with her that there was great depth to her work, and that it embodied a very special quality of attention that she had come to understand. The care that she takes with her products can be imparted to those who appreciate them, just as the plate of my childhood had imparted its creator's state of being to me.
Although my clients had been unimpressed by the tile, I loved it, and I set it on my desk, where it provided endless inspiration for my architectural work. I had picked up the tile on many occasions, looking at the changing shadows case by its relief pattern as I moved it in the light from the big window beside my desk. As my plate had earlier done for me, the tile held me in a sort of spirit dance, right in the middle of the day, unbeknownst to my colleagues who bustled around me. For a few moments, whenever I wanted, I could visit the font of vitality that beauty provides. I could breathe in the scent of the creative juice that the artist had poured into that tile and borrow its inspiration for the designs I was working on.
If we're struggling, thinking too hard, and worried about getting something done before our next meeting, our creativity is limited and derivative. But when we're attuned to the vitality of the moment, everything is informed by the creativity of that moment, everything is informed by the creativity of that moment. It's not something we possess or master; it's something that we are. There's no separation between creativity and you. That's why the vibrancy of another person's creative act can inspire our own. It's the state in which an object is made that's contagious.
Beauty as a Gateway to the Present
When I was finishing my office addition a year ago, I found the tile again. The trim work was under way, and a spot beside beside the new skylight was presenting a challenge. At at point where the wall meets the sloping ceiling, I was looking for a graceful way for the trim to turn the corner, and I suddenly realized that this favorite tile might offer the perfect transition. By placing it between the upper band of maple trim and the lower one of cherry, I could make the change of direction look effortless, and the tile would have a place constantly in the light, where its relief would stand out and I'd be able to enjoy it every day.
The space it inhabits is at the entry to the addition, as well as in the transition zone between my inner office and my outer office—my writing room and my communicate-with-the-world room. So every time I enter or exit the office and every time I move between inner and outer offices, I see the tile, and it prompts me to breathe. My heart skips a beat whenever I notice it. Each glance at this small point of beauty causes me to pause and to see with that other pair of glasses into the richness and meaningfulness of this moment.
That's what beauty can do. It's a doorway into the next dimension—the dimension that we normally think of as time but that really is beyond linear time, and in real time—in presence. Beauty, when you experience it fully, opens the door to being in the Now just as surely as any death-defying act, by stunning the senses equally as powerfully, though in a very different way.
Inspiration doesn't have to come just from the content of what you experience. In this instance it isn't the pattern or the shape of the tile that inspires me. It's the beauty that it exemplifies in my eyes and the quality of the attention I know went into its making, which in turn inspires me to pour the same kind of attention into my own creations. That attention can be brought to the creative process only when you are completely
engaged, unencumbered by your to-do list, and unfettered by linear time. It can be brought to bear only when you are completely present in what you are doing.
Beauty can be a powerful tool in helping to transport us to that place beyond time. It is the coming through of a quality from a dimension beyond your normal experience. Though we can't adequately explain it, we can see and feel beauty, and when we open ourselves to it, it can in turn allow us to transcend linear time and breathe in the vitality of simply being. If you can surround yourself with objects of delight, they will feed you in ways you never imagined.
SARAH SUSANKA is a bestselling author, architect, and cultural visionary. Her "build better, not bigger" approach to residential architecture has been embraced across the country, and her "Not So Big" philosophy has sparked an international dialogue, evolving beyond our houses and into how we inhabit our lives. In addition to sharing her insights with Oprah Winfrey and Charlie Rose, Susanka has been named a "Fast 50" innovator by Fast Company, a "top newsmaker" by Newsweek, and an "innovator in American culture" by U.S. News & World Report. She is a member of the College of Fellows of the American Institute of Architects and a senior fellow of the Design Futures Council. The author of seven books, Susanka lives in North Carolina. Visit her at www.susanka.com. This blog post is abridged from Chapter Two of her book The Not So Big Life.