We love our pets and they add so much to our lives. Here is a friend of ours. His name is Max, he’s a one year old Standard Poodle, and he is on a road trip from Maine to all four corners of America. To read about his trip through the eyes of his owner Maureen, go to their blog. I’m of course biased, but I’m finding this travel blog very interesting as I’m learning about new dog-friendly places to take ours, good eats, and how to keep oneself company when on a solitary journey. The blog is called Two Lanes and it’s also on wordpress. Enjoy!
Monthly Archives: January 2011
POLL: IS YOUR OFFICE WORKING FOR YOUR FENG SHUI? $99 will get you back on track in 2011…
Take the poll and let Feng Shui By Fishgirl know if you’re interested in the $99 feng shui office energizer consultation by mail. Free Love Power Heart signed print for everyone who books their office consultation during the month of February 2011. Consultation includes a review of your own personal office space or cubicle (ie: not the entire floor of an office building) to locate the Command Position and give you solutions for improving your work feng shui.
Contact fishgirl@earthlink.net for your by-mail Office Energizer Consultation. Include your phone number, mailing address, diagram sketch of your office space with your deck and other furniture details drawn in, entry door, etc (see this post for example of how to hand sketch your layout of your floorplan) and any photos and descriptions of your wall color, flooring material etc. We will get back to you within 3-4 weeks to confirm your consultation details and arrange for your payment via PayPal. You’ll receive your written report and your FREE Love Power Heart print soon after!
Filed under ART, Command Position, Feng Shui Office, Getting Organized, Giveaway
BALANCING YIN & YANG FOR GOOD FENG SHUI
Creating feng shui balance in your home can be as simple as getting a good mix of round shapes (yin) with square shapes (yang). The apartment here as 3 round tables (3 is also an auspicious feng shui number!), some round objets d’art on the tables, 2 round ottomans, a spiral / round art work on pedestal and the rest are rectangular or square shapes. The room could be improved by adding an area rug and more color (it’s a bit sterile for my taste) but the yin-yang mix is pretty well done. Take inventory of your home and see how many round and square shapes you have—is it balanced? See more of these apartments at
Filed under Architecture, Design, Feng Shui, Interior Design
A CHAIR FOR OCTOMOM?
I haven’t developed a sudden fascination with octopi nor have I become interested in Octomom. However, after my previous post about the octopus table I was given a hot lead on this octupus chair by designer Maximo Riera. Click the link which takes you over to designboom to see more pics of this highly stylized chair as well as how they made it. I give it a feng shui thumb’s up IF you’re Captain Nemo, Neptune, or a fishgirl.
Filed under Design, Feng Shui, Fun, Interior Design
A TABLE FIT FOR A FISHGIRL
Look what I found! This octopus has left his garden to become a table base. The tabletop is round glass (representing water, great feng shui for the fishgirl’s friend). I picture this table in our Maine house by the sea. Do you like? Are you a fan of the Steampunk movement? Click on this link to find out more about it:
CHAIR FUN SHUI
I could see Dr. Seuss sitting in this chair dreaming up his next book. Or Erica Wilson curled up in this chair with one of her famous needlepoint designs. Or a few of these amazing chairs could be scattered around the lobby of the museum at the Hiroshima Memorial Peace Park where all the colorful peace cranes are piled sky high…I discovered this cool chair while visiting a really cool new design blog (http://freshome.com). And THAT’s good FUN -shui. Click the link below to see more views of this fun chair. And feel free to post your ideas on who should be sitting in it or where you could most envision it…!
Striking Reupholstered Armchair with Colourful Good Luck Charms.
Filed under Design, Feng Shui, Fun, Interior Design
DEPRESSING DESIGNER’S SPACE
Image from The Crimson She Wolf
Imagine you have an appointment with an interior designer, a well-established member of ASID, the American Society of Interior Designers. You are driving 150 miles round trip to make this meeting and you are driving from a relatively small town to a big urban city with impressive skyscrapers and a reputation for sophistication. The address has a name with an implied connotation of class such as “The Ritz”. When you arrive at the designer’s address you see instead a building that looks an awful lot like this one below (emphasis on ‘awful’). You step onto the porch and see missing chunks creating a jagged zig-zag from the sagging wooden floorboards like the photo above, but worse.
Anonymous photo from the internet.
Not sure you’re at the right place, you finally notice a sign to the left of the door. The designer’s business sign is paint on wood. It is so old, so raggedy, faded and peeling, that it is invisible at first glance. I visited this designer and I must keep her name and her city anonymous.
The entire impression was that this property had been abandoned beyond neglect. When the designer opened the door, I was half expecting to be overwhelmingly surprised by an exceptional interior. I’m sorry to report that the inside was as decrepit as the outside. Only worse: cluttered with swatch books on every surface, dark and dingy. This was one of the worst examples of professional business feng shui that I have seen in quite some time. For somebody that makes their living off of providing interior design to others it is an absolute imperative to have a space that reflects one’s talent, design philosophy, and at the very minimum be well-maintained, clean, and professional looking.
I know it is difficult in this economy to splurge on fixing up your place. I am not even sure if this designer owned the building or was just renting. Either way, some things could be done to immediately improve the feng shui of the business:
*Move your design business to a better location, even if it’s smaller.
*If you can’t move, fix the floorboards to your entry. They are a hazard to any who visit you and they are like jagged spears preventing any positive opportunity from entering your space. Try to get the landlord to paint the exterior of the building.
*Repaint your sign. Do it yourself if you have to. Make the time. It’s only a 16″ x 20″ piece of wood with a couple of words on it. It will indicate that the business inside the wabi-sabi building is alive and well so people won’t decide to turn away.
*Clear out those front rooms where you meet with clients. Organize the swatch books, eliminate anything you don’t use or need.
*Paint the interior rooms bright colors or even bright white.
*Show a little bit of your design personality so that it’s obvious you are in the interior design business.
*Add some lighting.
Does your space have a similar story? Please share your professional space nightmares with us. Have you lost business because your space did not match your talent? Please share in comments section.
Filed under Design, Feng Shui, Feng Shui Office, Getting Organized, Interior Design
HARNESS RABBIT ENERGY IN 2011
You don’t have to be born in the Year of the Rabbit to harness the energy of the Rabbit for your home this year. The peace-loving Rabbit is wise and cautious and very ambitious. Rabbits are known to have a good eye for art, design, and fashion. It’s well known that actor Brad Pitt has a strong interest in design, and his partner Angelina Jolie is frequently on the best-dressed list. Both of these actors are born in Years of the Rabbit.
Bring an image of the Rabbit into your home to symbolize that you’re honoring the Rabbit this year. The Rabbit is used often in children’s goods. Anything from ceramic dishes and sippy cups to wallpaper and lamps. What you’re looking for is something sophisticated to reflect your grownup taste in addition to activating your children’s room.It can be a painting–or a print–with a Rabbit in it like this one from Isabelle Bryer Paintings that would be great in a young person’s room (especially if they were born in the Year of the Rabbit!). Isabelle’s painting of “St Alice” is a charming homage to Alice in Wonderland. Coincidentally, Johnny Depp played the Mad Hatter in the recent movie version of Alice in Wonderland. Johnny Depp’s Chinese zodiac sign is–you guessed it–Year of the Rabbit.
"Saint Alice" © Isabelle Bryer Paintings
Another wise choice would be to choose a Chinese calligraphy print of the symbol for the Rabbit—that way you don’t have to look at actual hares if you’re not partial to them. I found an inexpensive one on Amazon.com. Here’s a picture of it below:
Calligraphy symbol for "Hare" at Amazon.com
I found a site with several Rabbit tureens at various price points that would make great Year of the Rabbit gifts for your loved ones or yourself. Keeping the tureen displayed in the center of your dining table would be a good way to attract peaceful Rabbit energy.
Rabbits are also found on vintage pottery like this one I recently discovered on eBay. It’s very sleek and modern in design with a highly stylized Rabbit. With a bouquet of fresh red flowers in it you could use it as a feng shui solution to attract the prosperity and frugality of the Rabbit to your Wealth Area. Not sure where your Wealth Area is? Check my Feng Shui By Fishgirl bagua map. You could easily find a concrete or ceramic rabbit to put outside in your garden or the Wealth Area of your entire property as well.
Vintage rabbit Revere pottery on eBay
I did a little Googling and came up with this wonderful black Rabbit lamp on Hive.com, a design resource I love to browse for ideas and the latest in contemporary looks. Where to place such a lamp? If you’re looking to activate your Wisdom & Knowledge Area this year –perhaps you’re taking college courses, learning a new computer program, studying a new spiritual practice?–then you’d locate it in a room where you study. If you want a Rabbit to remind you of your good taste and love of beautiful decor, you could locate it within your living room in the center of your Tai Ch’i Area. The Tai Ch’i Area is also a great location for channeling Rabbit’s innate peacefulness—to put a rabbit symbol in your central core is to invite the harmony of Rabbit peace to enter your being. Turning on this lamp in your Wealth Area activates the ch’i that stimulates prosperity. Or put it in your Health Area to shed a light on good health. Check the bagua map page to discover what the 9 areas are and how to locate them within your overall home or within an individual room.
A great Rabbit lamp at Hive.com
So you see, there are many Rabbit items out there and many ways to bring Rabbit energy into your home. Rabbits make good pets, too, but only if you have time to take care of them properly. If you’ve always thought you might like a Rabbit as a pet, this is a good year to do it! I do not recommend Rabbit fur in your home—death energy is the last thing you want to bring into your happy home.
Use your creativity and your intuition to decide where you most need Rabbit energy to help you this year. Another way to bring in the Rabbit energy is to have photos of people you know to be wealthy, successful people born in the Year of the Rabbit. (You could have a movie poster of Johnny Depp for instance in your dorm room this year!). Good luck and may the Year of the Rabbit bring you peace and prosperity in 2011.
Rabbit Johnny Depp playing the Mad Hatter
Filed under ART, Design, Feng Shui, gifts, Holidays, Pets, Uncategorized, Wealth & Finances
KUNG HEI FAT CHOI: YEAR OF THE RABBIT 2011
Original artwork © Po Lo 2011
Chinese New Year is soon upon us and I’d like to wish all of you Kung Hey Fat Choi (or happy new year!). It’s the Year of the Rabbit following the Year of the Tiger. My friend artist Po Lo created the original artwork you see here. Po’s work is very reminiscent of Erte or Vargas. To see last year’s art from Po Lo: click here. Keep coming back as I will be discussing ways for you to harness Rabbit energy in the new year.
Filed under ART, Feng Shui, Uncategorized
CRAPPY FENG SHUI: Chinese Toilet Restaurant Is Full of Sh*t
You can’t make this up, people. Click on the link for the full article in the Village Voice:
Chinese Toilet Restaurant Is Full of Shit – New York Restaurants and Dining – Fork in the Road.
Meanwhile, I think it’s pretty obvious why this scatalogically themed novelty restaurant does not have good feng shui. But just in case, let’s go over the reasons:
* Toilets leak ch’i (energy). Yes, these have the lids down, but still there must be 30 or more toilet seats in this joint. That’s a lot of symbolic energy draining!
*Speaking of symbology…has a turd ever represented something positive and uplifting? Even if they’re in abundance like the turd shaped pillows at this restaurant, they do not represent wealth and good fortune.
*Even the name, “Modern Toilet” suggests flushing profits down the drain.
This restaurant is located in China. Don’t they believe in feng shui? Yes, ancient Chinese practiced feng shui. In modern China many of the old traditions and culturally significant arts were lost in the Mao period. Even great Chinese cuisine was absent for many decades as chefs fled to Taiwan and Hong Kong during the Cultural Revolution. In the past decade, they came back to China. We wish the owners of this restaurant only the best but we feel their success is ultimately a crap shoot.
Filed under Design, Feng Shui, Fun, Interior Design
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