Cozy

Hello my fancy friends, thank you so much for tuning in today. I hope you’re doing good, staying comfortable, drinking lots of water, not pushing yourself too much. Our energy is precious, and our homes can serve as refueling stations when we set them up with that intention. This can look like a lot of things, but I usually think of trying to create a space that feels cozy to help me restore and revitalize. From around 2016-2018, the world was captivated by the trend of Hygge, the Danish word that incapsulates specifically Nordic coziness. This practice has been perfected by our friends in Scandinavia because each year, the winter months bring exceptionally long nights -Copenhagen’s shortest day is a mere four hours of sunlight in December, leaving 20 hours of darkness, and that’s one of the most Southern cities. It only gets more extreme as we go North to places like Helsinki and Stockholm. Add in average temperatures in 30’s and you’ve got a receipt for staying indoors, in your home. But the principals that make up a cozy home don’t have to be limited to the colder climates. In fact, I find myself staying indoors more during New York’s infamous August humidity than I do during our colder months. When we boil down coziness to its basic elements, there are simple ideas that anyone can implement to create an inviting space in any climate, any time of year. So today, we are getting super cozy for all four seasons, all over the world.  

But first, let’s talk about the Color of The Week. November is Trans Awareness month. This is a great time to celebrate the amazing trans folks in our lives, which we should be doing 12 months out of the year anyways, but November makes if an official celebration. And if you don’t have someone in your life that’s trans, it’s a great time to get educated on the issues the community is dealing with and how to be supportive. You can check out GLAAD’s website, which is linked in the show notes of this episode, to find information, resources, Frequently Asked Questions, articles and links to donate. That is why our dual color of the week is Pantone 210C and 305C, the colors of the transgender flag. This flag features five stripes  in light blue, light pink, and white; and was designed by Monica Helms in 1999.  You may see this flag displayed all over the world including State Capital buildings, on bumper stickers, store windows, and on clothing this month in support of the trans community. Trans rights are human rights, and we all deserve a world were we can be our true selves.

The idea of coziness is talked about all the time, but what is it, and how to we achieve it regardless of the season or our location? It can’t just be about covering up with a super plush blanket and wearing slippers. We can be cozy regardless of the temperature or our sensory sensitivities. 

We are effectively looking at two major buckets to create coziness, with a few caveats, of course. There’s lighting and texture. And frankly, texture via lighting, so, it’s more like texture texture texture! But we’ll get into that, one thing at a time. 

Environments we perceive as sterile and cold are slick, minimal, lacking variety, and evenly light. Imagine a hospital built in the 1980’s or an old office building. The ceiling has an even repetition of overhead lighting, there’s lack of a view to the outside and an overwhelming view of the inside. I’m getting the Ick already, I don’t know about you. It grosses me out just saying all of that, but it’s important to acknowledge common practices that we see everywhere that are actively achieving the opposite of what we want and to qualify why these practices are failing us. Spaces that are too rhythmic, too repetitive, too even; offer zero visual interest or visual hierarchy. Our brains literally don’t know where to look first or where to rest, and it’s subconsciously anxiety inducing. So, basically we want the opposite of all this.

Let’s start with lighting. Lighting is everything in a cozy environment. And not just any lighting. First, we look to the sun, of course! If you have sunlight in your space, you have to study it so that you can use its power for good. If you live in the North Hemisphere, above the equator, the majority of your sunshine is coming from the South. The sun rises in the East, sets in the West and travels through the South half of the sky. And if you don’t know, that is most of the people who listen to the podcast so, the United States, Canada, Europe - all in the Northern Hemisphere. If you’re in the Southern Hemisphere, so that’s Australia, Brazil, South Africa, the sun will be in the North part of the sky - rising in the East, setting in the West and traveling from East to West in the North. And this is all great right, but chances are your windows are where they are, and they aren’t moving anywhere even if they get barely any light or too much sunlight at 4pm. But, you do want to understand what direction the windows in your house face, and where the sun hits thru out the day. You can use the little compass app on your phone or honestly just look at the sun in the morning, 12pm, and at sunset, and that should give you a sense of where those cardinal directions are in relation to your home. You can also track the sun’s rays in your home, by putting  a little piece of masking tap where the sun hits, and write down on the tape the date and time.  You can also make notes like rating the brightness of sun from 1-10. This will even shift over the course of the year because the sun is higher in the sky in the summer and lower in the sky in the winter, which creates totally different lighting effects. For me, because I’ve got a lot of tall buildings around me, because I live in the city, the low winter sun is blocked out, and I actually a ton of sun in the summer, when I’m trying to keep it out. 

All this to say, you can utilize the sun to make your space feel more cozy depending on time of day and temperature. If you live in a super hot climate, you might want to get some strong shades to block the sun when it’s at its hottest. For this - I recommend a blackout roller shade that covers the whole window and it’s frame. This is not a decorative looking window covering, but it blocks the sun like no other, and when you do want to have sunlight or just see out your window, it rolls up and retracts completely. You can also do this with regular curtains, they just have to be blackout curtains, which means the fabric is woven and constructed to keep light out.

If you are in a colder climate and want to utilize the sun, you can add sheer window coverings that let light in, but still provide privacy when you need it. You can also add more celebratory items like a prism shaped sun catcher. These refract light and project gorgeous geometric shapes in tons of colors all over your home. They need to be hung in direct sunlight, so if you’ve got a big ray coming it, you can hang it in the ray’s path for a stunning light show.  You can look for these on Etsy, or even make your own if you want, and what makes these so effective at creating a cozy environment is they have two properties that makes lighting feel good to we humanoids.

This is one of the most important things about interior lighting - these two properties are what we referred to as dynamic and diffuse. This is simply emulating the transient characteristic of lighting in nature. So when we create overhead lighting that is evenly spaced and evenly disturbed, it feels fake and stagnant. When we think about the joy that sunshine peering through tree branches creates, this a momentary, asymmetrical lighting experience. So as much as possible, when you’re placing electric lighting in your home, you want to create a variety of lighting level options, layers, and patterns. This can be helped by the use of dimmer switches, multiple lamps placed thru out the room, spot lights that project patterns and colors, and the use of string lights. You might call these fairy lights, Christmas lights, or twinkle lights, but they all refer to the same idea, a plug-in wire that has small light bulbs every few inches.

There are studies that concluded that string lights can aid in the production of dopamine in humans, and we usually save these for the holidays, which is fine, you can use them any time of year, I’m giving you full permission to put up string lights literally whenever you want. You know, back in 2020 in New York when we were all at home and everyone was feeling not great, lots of people in the city put their holiday lights up in their windows or on their balconies to boost spirits, and it helped honestly, but you don’t need a global crisis to do this, you can use them any time. They look particularly good on the ceiling, you can stick them up with command hooks, and zig and zag them across  your room, just keep them tight to the ceiling, don’t let them droop down too much, and choose a cord color that is close to your ceiling color, so for many of us, that’s a white cord. This makes your space feel like an outdoor terrace at a restaurant, it lowers the perceived height of the ceiling without feeling too enclosed, and it’s relatively easy to do. 

And these lighting techniques are all creating texture through lighting, and when I say texture, I’m talking about the visual or tactile surface characteristics and appearance of an element.  That’s the dictionary definition of texture, okay. But smooth is a texture, plain is a texture. Typically, when interior designers say the word texture, they are talking about things that are not smooth. We’re talking about things with character, with natural variety inherent in the way a material or surface looks and feels. Imagine unpolished granite, sandblasted wood, Venetian plaster, or even just a tile floor in your bathroom. That is texture, and incorporating it into our homes and the spaces we inhabit increases the cozy factor exponentially. When we are calm and quiet and enjoying our spaces, we notice more details around us. You might not be paying attention to the exact pattern of the carpet at the airport until your flight gets delayed for 5 hours because you have nothing else to do. But in our homes, the goal is to be at rest, and our brains will naturally notice details like texture, so gifting ourselves with a wide variety of textures -includng different sizes, shapes, patterns, and colors - will help our brains naturally transition from the busyness of the day to the quiet of home life.

But don’t forget, textures need a hierarchy structure so that the room doesn’t look overwhelming or underwhelming. Pick one or two really bold textures, like a patterned wallpaper on an accent wall, or a super chunky rug. Then a handful of items should be more medium sized textures like a terrazzo coffee table or a wood headboard. Everything after that should be more subtle textures like delicate knit throw blankets, oversized floor tiles, concrete side tables, and wood accessories.

At the same time, you want to think about the climate you are in. If it’s cold outside, of course you want to bring in materials that feel warm - things like wood, thick rugs, extra blankets, overstuffed sofas that look like they’re going to eat you alive, long heavy curtains, and warm torchere style light fixtures. Everything feels hot. But if you’re already in a warm climate, think about bringing in cooling, breathable textures like slabs of marble, breathable linens, ceramic tile, lots of house plants, fans, even bring water itself in with a decorative fountain or a clear glass vase filled with fresh cut flowers. 

If your neck of the woods experiences multiple seasons, think of having a cooling materials palette as a base and swap in warmer accessories in the winter months. And no matter what temperature it is outside, do not shy away from color and pattern, whether its in the fabric of your furniture, the paint or wallpaper on your walls, or even your floors. The examples with we see of Nordic Hygge are so freaking beige, and it does a disservice to the whole aesthetic because too much beige feels sterile, we are actively working to make our spaces not feel sterile. Please include color in your home if you want it to feel cozy. And that’s the last thing I will say to you today. Try some of these ideas out, and message me in Instagram, let me know how they went for you. I know you’re doing awesome, you’re being your best self, and I am so proud of you. Talk to you next time.